Anyone can paint their home’s interior, but achieving a professional finish takes care and preparation. The following ten tips will help you make your home interior paint project a success.
1. Clean Your Walls First
Spider webs, soot, grime, and dirt make it difficult for paint to adhere to walls. To clean your walls, start by dry mopping the surface to remove spider webs. Next, use a damp cotton rag to wash down the walls and remove the dirt. Allow the walls to dry fully before continuing.
2. Use Canvas Drop Cloths (Not Plastic!)
Canvas drop cloths are superior to plastic drop cloths in several ways. Canvas is designed to absorb paint so that spills dry relatively quickly. In addition, canvas is heavier and thicker than plastic tarps. It stays in place without slipping and cannot be punctured by ladder legs.
3. Use High-Quality Paint Brushes and Paint
Your paint job can only be as good as your paintbrushes and paint. Cheap paintbrushes produce lines in the paint that must be smoothed before they dry. Bad-quality paintbrushes also lose bristles on the walls as they paint. In addition, poor-quality paint tends to be thinner and provides uneven coverage, requiring more coats of paint and more work from you.
4. Use Thick Nap for Textured Walls
Textured walls have deep nooks and crannies that normal paint rollers can’t reach. Purchase paint rollers with thicker nap to get good coverage on textured walls.
5. Prime Patched Areas of the Wall
Patched areas may absorb paint differently than the rest of your wall, leading to a splotchy, uneven finish. To ensure that your patched areas look the same as your non-patched areas, prime patched areas before painting.
6. Remove Light Switch Covers, Smoke Detectors, and More
Trying to paint around light switch covers, smoke detectors, and vent covers can cause problems if you decide to replace those items later because the color underneath those covers will not be the same. Remove your vent covers before painting to avoid problems in the future.
7. Get an Extension Pole
Extension poles allow you to paint large areas of the wall without using a ladder or straining your back. This makes painting easier and more pleasant for you.
8. Use a Roller on the Edges
Paint rollers texture the paint differently than paintbrushes. To get an even application of paint all over your walls, use a narrow paint roller to paint the edges of your walls instead of paintbrushes.
9. Store Paintbrushes in the Fridge Overnight
Washing your paintbrushes wastes paint if you plan to continue painting later. To avoid washing your brushes between paint sessions, remove excess paint, then wrap the paintbrush in plastic wrap and put it in the refrigerator overnight. (Keep your paint products away from your beer! Latex paint looks good but tastes bad.) This same technique will work with your paint rollers.
10. Clean Your Rollers Thoroughly
Paint rollers are notoriously difficult to clean. To get the job done right, use the curved edge of a 5-in-1 tool to scrape paint off the roller and back into the paint can. Next, drop the roller into a bucket of water or solvent and use a stiff-bristled brush to remove the excess paint.
Stop at Tashman Hardware for Your Paint Products
Tashman Hardware is your source for quality paint products like canvas tarps, paint rollers, extension poles, paint, and more. As your neighborhood home improvement store, Tashman Home Center is the place to head for the above-mentioned items or anything you might need to improve your home’s efficiency.
We are now open daily to better serve you, or you can shop online. In addition to having over 20,000 items in stock, we have knowledgeable and friendly staff, and we’re always happy to help in any way we can!
