A Bogmalo wall that looks towards the bay is taking in salt and moisture every day of the year, and wallpaper should stay off it. Seams lift, and in a home shut for a season nobody is there to press them back. The walls that suit paper are the sheltered inner ones, given a fungicidal primer coat and hung with vinyl-coated paper. Look for white salt bloom on the plaster before starting; where it shows, the wall is not ready. In holiday lets, use a hard-wearing design behind the bed and keep it away from passages. The larger villas have big walls in air-conditioned rooms, where a mural or wide pattern holds well. Damp walls want PVC panels instead.
- Holiday-let bedrooms: durable vinyl wallpaper behind the bed on an inner wall, with one spare roll kept for patching.
- Sea-facing walls: no wallpaper here, since salt and moisture come through the plaster; PVC panels cope where paper cannot.
- Villa living rooms: a large-scale design on a tall, sheltered wall of a room kept air-conditioned, planned from the top down.
Bogmalo is a small bay with a sandy beach on the seaward side of the Mormugao peninsula, a few kilometres from Dabolim. It has a beach resort, a handful of hotels and guest houses, a fishing community, and apartments and villas on the slope behind the beach.
Homes and hotel rooms here face the sea or sit just behind it. Many are second homes and holiday lets that stand closed for part of the year, so furnishings must cope with being shut up in humid weather and opened again for guests.
Bogmalo is as exposed to salt as anywhere in Goa: the beach is a few steps away and the wind comes straight off the water. Steel rusts quickly, natural fabrics hold damp, and anything outdoors needs marine-grade materials.
Sea-facing homes
Sea-facing walls take in salt and moisture, and paper lifts at the seams if the wall is not sealed. Use vinyl-coated wallpaper on an anti-fungal primer, and keep it to inner walls or walls that do not face the weather. Check for salt bloom on the plaster first.
Holiday lets and guest houses
For a let property, choose a hard-wearing vinyl in a design that will not date, and use it where luggage and furniture will not scrape it: behind the bed, not in the corridor. A spare roll kept back makes later repairs possible.
