I'm not sure I understand your question ...Is the overlapped material underneath the plaster and lath or on the surface? If on the surface, and you don't think it's wall paper or NU-wall, then it may be canvas or some other attempt to either cover-up crumbling plaster or to provide a smooth surface for decorative painting. Why don't you want to remove it? (Other than it being a a nasty job to do.) Have you tried loosening it in a concealed area to assess how hard it would be to remove? You will always see those seams unless you sand them down, which might be a bigger pain than simpy removing the covering. A lot would depend on what your plaster is like underneath and whether you have rough or finish coat as a top surface. Perhaps your plaster is only rough coat and the paper was installed to make it easier to get a smooth finish. Another alternative would be to remove it and get a top coat put on. Or you could just slap a coat of paint over it and move on. As for cleaning, I wouldn't hesitate to use any cleaner, including TSP. Generally I prefer powdered products, rather liquids as I think the powders leave less residue. At the moment I am using up some green powdered laundry detergent, with out enzymes or optical brightening agents, and I like how it's going. (The stuff was a complete dud for laundry, though.) Some people wash with strong ammonia nd water solutions, but I hate that stuff. I have also used Lysol liquid detergents and been satisfied, but now prefer the powdered stuff. I have seen Spic and Span recommended, though I can't stand the smell. Another tactic is to use a steam cleaner. I have a Lady Bug, and while I'm not at all impressed with most of its uses, wall cleaning is something it does do well, though very slowly. (It can also steam wallpaper residue off, so try it first before doing a whole room if you choose to keep whatever is on your walls.) For primer, I have used Kilz and BIN, and both are very good but incredibly stinky to use (you really need to have an open window). Alisande's recommendation for using a good quality primer, is also good, particularly if you decide to just paint over the surface for now. With old houses knowing when to go whole hog and restore like crazy and when to just get things cleaned up and looking fine is the key to a happy life. Sounds like maybe just painting over your wall surfaces (after some cleaning) might be a good choice for you. Happy spring cleaning! Molly

If you do a search for border removal, you should get lots of posts--seems many people have this problem. From my own experience, first determine if the border will come off fairly easily by holding a wet sponge against it to slightly saturate & then try pulling any loose areas. What eventually worked for me, after using a paper tiger & removal gel, and a clothes steamer (not good-melted the paint), was just using a cloth & saturating the remnants of the border with Downy liquid fabric softener. Not sure if that's what did the trick, but it worked as well as anything else & smelled nice too! Just be prepared for possibly lots of tedious work--mine was like scraping confetti off the wall...scraping with my "Pampered Chef" pot scraper & fingernails. After it's all removed, cover with a coat of Gardz; this will prevent any residual glue from getting into your new topcoat. Happy scraping!

This is so FUNNY in not a ha ha way. Here I am four years later actually getting to the job. One wall done--paper off. At the moment I am washing, washing, washing to get the Diff and glue off the wall. DD#2 moves otu this weekend adn then we can remove furniture from the room I am working in and I will get to the other walls. I did use a tiger..to get water to the paper layer. I have never had a problem with it. I really was hoping to not have to do this in two steps..first the vinyl then the paper backing. I obviously forgot the advise from the experts that was offered. I will try on the next wall but I will have to try and pull the vinyl from the bottom up as there is a boarder that is glued down TIGHT. The elbow grease it takes to get the glue off is insane. Where is the miracle product that just dissolves it? I am using vinegar and water, trying to avoid the TSP. Well back at it. Thanks for checking back in!!

If the wallpaper was put on textured walls, then once you remove all the wallpaper and all the glue (its water soluble), and clean the walls very well, you should only need to prime it with gardz and then repaint it. No, you should not have to skim coat it.