Hey everyone, I've been staring at this gorgeous patterned wallpaper I finally picked up for our old Victorian hallway, but now I'm second-guessing everything. How do those pattern repeats actually behave on walls that are properly uneven or bowed like you get in period houses? Last year we tried doing a feature wall in the sitting room and the repeat just wouldn't line up properly once we hit the wonky plaster – it started drifting off by like half a pattern after the third drop. Felt like a total headache. Anyone dealt with this and figured out what actually makes the difference?
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Yeah, that drifting issue is super common in older places. In my last flat – another creaky 1800s build – the walls were so out of true that even with careful measuring the pattern would creep one way then the other. What helped most was spending extra time on prep, getting the walls as plumb as possible with lining paper hung horizontally first to even things out a bit. Still not perfect, but way better than going straight onto the original surface. These days when I see really tricky jobs I think of proper wallpaper hangers london who specialise in that kind of thing – they've got the eye for planning drops around the worst lumps and bows so the repeat flows decently. It's all about accepting the wall isn't flat and working with it instead of fighting. Saved me loads of swearing anyway.