You can paint wallpaper or put furniture against it once the paste behind it is dry. There is no fixed number of hours: temperature, humidity, ventilation and the surface underneath decide, and Intervos says not to apply its products below 5 °C or above 70% humidity. If you paint the wallpaper, you then have to wait for the paint as well.
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Our own wallpaper hangers build the drying time into the job, so you know when each room will be ready again.
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How long does wallpaper paste take to dry?
Wallpaper paste is mostly water. According to the Intervos product sheets, the transparent non-woven paste M5 has a dry matter content of about 8% and the universal wall paste M29 about 27%. The rest has to evaporate, through the wallpaper, the seams and the wall, before the strip is properly fixed.
Four things decide how quickly that happens:
The amount of paste matters too. Intervos gives a consumption of about 200 grams per m² for its pastes. On a painted or other non-absorbent wall, all that moisture has to escape through the wallpaper. If you are going to wallpaper over a painted wall, allow for a longer drying time. And in a new-build home, the new walls release moisture themselves as well.
When can you paint over wallpaper?
First, the question of whether you paint the wallpaper at all. Renovation fleece, glass fleece and woven glass fabric are made to be painted. Paper, patterned and vinyl wallpapers are the finish themselves, so you do not paint them. If you choose vinyl wallpaper, that is your finish straight away.
You only paint over paintable wallpaper once the paste underneath is dry. Water-based wall paint adds new moisture to the wallpaper, and if that lands on a layer of paste that is still wet, it raises the risk of bubbling and seams lifting. With renovation fleece, the paint therefore only goes on once the renovation fleece is dry enough to paint.
If a second coat is needed, you wait for the first. Sigma gives dry after about 2 hours and recoatable after about 4 hours on data sheet 4014NL, at 23 °C and 50% humidity; the product page says dry after about 1 hour. In practice, we leave about 1 day between two coats.
When can you put furniture back and hang things on the wall?
Furniture can go back into the room, but not straight against a wall that is still drying. A wardrobe or sofa pressed against a wet strip or a fresh coat of paint leaves a mark and traps moisture in that spot.
The product sheets do not give a fixed number of hours for this. The rule of thumb is the same as for painting: the wall must be dry all over, not just to the eye.
Is wallpaper dry as soon as it feels dry?
No. The surface of the wallpaper dries first. The paste between the wallpaper and the wall dries last, because the moisture has the furthest to travel. A strip can feel dry at the front while it is still wet behind.
Watch the seams and the edges by windows, doors and the ceiling: that is where you see first whether a strip is still moving. A new strip of paper wallpaper expands with the moisture and shrinks as it dries, and a seam can then pull open slightly. Non-woven wallpaper keeps its size when pasted and is less affected.
If you want to help the drying along, ventilate rather than just turning the heating up. Heat without ventilation leaves the moisture hanging in the room.
How do we plan the drying, painting and handover?
You do not have to judge for yourself when the paste is dry enough. One of our 40 in-house wallpaper hangers pastes, fills and paints in the same job, using Intervos wallpaper and Sigma paint, and the drying time is built into that schedule.
For renovation fleece in a whole home, that is 3 days of work in total. In other situations, how long it takes to have a home wallpapered varies, for example if a skim coat has to go on first.
At handover we go through the walls with you, including the seams and the edges. Renovation fleece costs from €14.99 per m², including sanding, pasting, filling and one coat of paint, and our wallpapering work carries a 1-year guarantee.
Prices exclude VAT. For the renovation of a home over 10 years old, 6% VAT usually applies; the VAT rate is stated in the quote.
When you apply, tell us when you want to furnish the rooms again. The free quote you receive within 24 hours will then already take the drying time into account. At the site visit we check whether your walls are absorbent or painted, because that determines how quickly the paste dries.
This is how we work with every type of wallpaper, if you have your home wallpapered.
By the Bouwsector België team, 97 in-house tradespeople · reviewed by