Old council house - walls not plastered??

antiskeptic

Am looking at (at a guess) 1950's mass concrete built ex-council house. The whole place is covered with woodchip wallpaper, which I'd be looking to strip off

There are some old built in wardrobes in the bedrooms and the walls are unpapered. The wall finish isn't smooth plaster. Rather it looks more like a rendered exterior wall: like very rough sandpaper. Its harder than plaster too.

Looking behind peeling wallpaper around the place, I see that this finish seems to be utilised throughout.

Was such a finish commonplace? I've never seen it (but then again, haven't looked at an ex-council house before.

Ak84

Yeah. My house the same. 1930's built.
The wall above the picture rail has a better finish. Not sure if that was done after original constuction or not.
Some walls better than others.
But a well built house all the same.

antiskeptic

Ak84 wrote: »

Yeah. My house the same. 1930's built.
The wall above the picture rail has a better finish. Not sure if that was done after original constuction or not.
Some walls better than others.
But a well built house all the same.

Perhaps they figured the wall would be papered in heavy paper, rendering plastering unnecessary. Or they figured council tenants didn't warrant a smooth finish.

listermint

very common, and generally have to pull it all down to get a flat finish, so replastering the whole house.

Markcheese

antiskeptic wrote: »

Perhaps they figured the wall would be papered in heavy paper, rendering plastering unnecessary. Or they figured council tenants didn't warrant a smooth finish.

My grans house in West Cork has that rendered plaster finish inside... Privatly built in the early 80s..