Renters, Rejoice! This Peel-and-Stick Flooring Is a Quick Fix for Shabby Hardwoods
"Hearst Magazines and Yahoo may earn commission or revenue on some items through the links below."
The Product on Trial
Chasing Paper Peel and Stick Flooring
The Tester
Melanie Yates, longtime renter with a love for temporary design fixes
The Brief
If you're looking for a way to visually define a space, you can use paint colors, strategically placed bookshelves, and accent lights to help create vignettes that divide one room into many. Paying attention to your floors is a smart idea, too. While laying down a rug can help make an entryway space stand out from the larger living room, sometimes changing the floors themselves can make a big impact on a space. I'll be completely honest with you — this thought had never occurred to me before I found out about the Chasing Paper Peel and Stick Flooring, but I'm so happy it did.
Chasing Paper is a brand known and beloved for its expansive selection of wallpaper. Available in both traditional and peel-and-stick versions, their patterns are vibrant, eye-popping, and unique. They make measuring and installation as easy as possible with their on-site footage calculator. They also offer a Peel and Stick Install Kit, which includes a pencil, an X-Acto knife, and a wallpaper smoother — and, trust me, these tools really come in handy.
Even though Chasing Paper's Peel and Stick Flooring is a relatively new product category for the brand, they already have a ton of options to choose from. They currently offer 34 different designs and colors to make over your floors — from veined marble to subway tile. The panels are made of self-adhesive vinyl that's finished with a laminate overlay, and they come in single 2x4-foot strips or a set of eight 12x12-inch squares. Both sizes cost $50, which is comparable to a standard roll of adhesive wallpaper.
Eager to transform my apartment's small entryway area that I've been crossing in and out of for 9 whole years, I sought out the Chasing Paper Peel and Stick Flooring in the Blue Black tile pattern to give a little more life to this liminal space. This wasn't my first experience in the wide world of peel-and-stick products, either: Last year, I wallpapered my kitchen and bedroom and I also applied privacy film on my windows that looks like stained glass. From these projects, I learned that a steady hand, a sharp blade, and a patient temperament are prerequisites for any kind of adhesive project, so I anticipated these sticky floor panels to be a bit of an undertaking.
Luckily, I found the Chasing Paper Peel and Stick Flooring to be incredibly easy to install — it's a perfect project for DIY beginners. I papered this small entryway space all by myself in less than just 1 hour. The panels' matte laminate finish is shine-free, fade-resistant, and feels pleasantly smooth (not tacky or slippery) underfoot.
Unlike most of the wallpaper patterns I've worked with in the past, the geometric design of the two 2x4-foot panels that I received was very easy to line up for a perfect match — but do be aware that some patterns might be trickier to install than others. Peeling and sticking was just as easy, and if I made a mistake, I could pull it up and restick it into place — the adhesive of this flooring is pretty forgiving.
One thing to note if you've ever attempted wallpapering (or floor-papering, in this case) is that you'll quickly learn how off-kilter the angles in your home really are. When lining up this adhesive to be flush with the wall, it was clear that it would not fit into a perfect right angle with my doorway — as you can see from the images, the angle is slightly wider than 90 degrees. I realized I wouldn't have enough scraps leftover from my two panels to perfectly fill in every single gap, so that's just one thing I'd advise looking out for if you were to tackle this type of project. Despite this, I love how the Chasing Paper Peel and Stick Flooring panels completely transformed the space, and that the look is totally temporary if I want it to be.
Closing Argument
In the month that I've had these panels on my floors, I haven't experienced any issues with the pieces unsticking and curling in the humidity, bubbling up, getting scratched, or showing spots when they come into contact with moisture. Granted, I am a solo dweller with a no-indoor-shoes policy, so if your home's entryway is a higher-traffic area, these floor panels may experience more wear and tear. Just like wallpaper, they're meant to be a cosmetic enhancement, not an impenetrable shield for the surface underneath.
I have big plans for making over my little entryway space into something really special, and laying on these peel-and-stick floor panels has already made such a difference. Beyond the apartment foyer, I can also see this vinyl flooring working in a home office, hallway, or kitchen to bring new life to an old but beloved space.
More of Chasing Paper's Peel-and-Stick Designs:
You Might Also Like