Hey everyone, has anyone else run into really weird stuff when trying to plaster walls in those old Victorian or Edwardian places before slapping on paint? Like, you think you've got a solid surface, but then bam—something totally catches you off guard.
A while back I was helping strip back layers in my mate's 1905 terrace house, expecting maybe just some crumbly old lime under the wallpaper. Nope. Turned out half the wall had these random patches where the original lath was rotten in spots from some long-ago leak nobody noticed, and the plaster was basically hanging on by a thread in places. Made the whole skim job way trickier than planned, and we ended up chasing damp traces for days. What's the most surprising substrate headache you've dealt with in these period homes? Curious to hear your war stories!
Yeah, those old houses love throwing curveballs. In my experience the worst surprises often come from mismatched modern fixes people did years ago—like someone slapped cement-based stuff over breathable lime plaster, trapping moisture and causing hidden bulging or delaminating that only shows up when you start scraping. Or finding horsehair plaster that's gone powdery in random sections because of poor ventilation in bay windows. It always feels like you're uncovering little time capsules of bad decisions. I've chatted with a few painters and decorators south london who swear by really gentle prep work on these builds to avoid making things worse—definitely worth it for a lasting finish without the walls fighting back later.