We have just a couple days to prep some beat-up walls in a closet prior to an installer coming to put in organizing shelves.

The walls are hundred year old plaster with two layers of wallpaper. The outer layer of wallpaper is pretty well adhered, though it's brittle like old leaves in places where it's loose. The underneath layer is so stuck to the plaster that any attempt to peel it away just causes the plaster to turn to dust.

We had to remove a bunch of old cleats and other hardware that did not have wallpaper behind them. As a result, the walls are a total mess: divots in the plaster, parts with no wallpaper, the occasional tear in the wallpaper, and then vast expanses of perfectly smooth wallpaper.

We'd like to have reasonably smooth, white walls. Any ideas of the best approach? Can we patch the holes and skim coat over everything?

Thank you!