Amsberry’s Experts Share How To Prep For Interior Painting
How To Prepare For Interior
Painting In Brewster, WA
Step-by-Step Guide to Preparing Your Brewster, WA
Home for a Perfect Interior Paint Job
When it comes to interior painting in Brewster, WA, a flawless finish starts before the first coat of paint. Proper preparation is half the work, and it’s also the key to an eye-popping look. Not only will the color look better, but your investment in repainting will last longer if you take the time to do it right.
Whether you’re going the DIY route or hiring a trusted Brewster, WA painting contractor like Amsberry, prep ultimately saves you both time and money. Here are some of our interior painting guru’s top prep tips.
Start With Pristine Walls: A TSP Wipe Down
Bottom line: your walls must be completely clean. Dust, oil, and grime, which are most common in high-touch areas like kitchens and hallways, prevent paint from adhering well. That’s where TSP (trisodium phosphate) comes in. TSP is a champion detergent available at hardware stores. It comes in liquid or powder form.
To use TSP, mix ½ cup of TSP with two gallons of lukewarm water. Apply it to your walls with a damp sponge or cloth. Start at the top of your walls and work down. Let it sit for a few minutes, then rinse it off with clean water. The walls will need time to dry before you paint.
While there are numerous ways to clean walls before painting, TSP is the gold medal winner in our experience.
Tape Off Edges And Trim
“I’ll just paint around the baseboards and windows really slowly and carefully,” is the deception every painter has fantasized about. It’s a gamble that rarely pays off. We’ve all been in enough houses and buildings where that was clearly the painter’s mentality…and did not pay off.
Taking the time to tape off your paint area is just basic adulting – and, yes, it’s as much fun as filing income taxes and waking up early to go to work every day! It’s best to just bite the bullet and remind yourself that taping really only takes a few minutes for a wall you’ll have to look at for years.
Use high-quality blue painter’s masking tape to cover baseboards, window frames, door frames, and adjacent surfaces. Apply the tape in straight, even lines. To prevent the paint from seeping under the tape, apply it lightly around the tape, and make sure the tape has been pressed down firmly.
Again, a little extra TLC on careful taping can save you a lot of time and frustration on having to make touch-ups later.
Protect Your Floors With Drop Cloths
Painters who love to skip taping think drop cloths are “optional.” You have to think worst-case scenario, unfortunately. Chipping a bunch of drips off a beautiful floor or needing to call carpet cleaners is a hassle. Interior painting in Brewster, WA or anywhere can get messy. No matter how careful you are.
Again, it only takes a few minutes to put old sheets, towels, or tarps down on your floor. If you buy drop cloths at the hardware store, they are only going to add a few dollars to your project budget – well worth the investment.
Plastic-lined canvas drop cloths are Amsberry Painting’sexperts’ recommendation. Pure plastic on the floor to catch drips and spills leaves a slippery mess. Combining plastic and canvas gives you the best of both worlds: the drips soak in but don’t bleed through to your floor.
Pro Tip: Tape rosin paper to the baseboards for added protection along the edges. Then lay your drop cloths throughout the space, lining up with the taped edges.
Remove Fixtures
Your curtain rods, switch plates, outlet covers, and doorknobs should be removed before painting. Yep, it’s a chore. But it gives your finished product a markedly cleaner finish. A paint job can make a room pop…or turn it into a glaring eyesore. It all comes down to the details.
Be sure to keep screws and small accessories organized by taping them together, putting them in ziplocs, and/or labeling them with a piece of painter’s tape. You’ll thank yourself later when it’s time to put them all back!
If all this prep seems daunting, remember you can always contact the Brewster, WA interior painting professionals at Amsberry for a free estimate!