Krafty Kriz: 7 Steps to Prepare a Room for Painting

Excellent surface preparation ensures that the paint finish of different surfaces will be excellent too. Kriz shows us in this video the 7 steps you need to prepare a room for painting. Do take the time to follow these 7 steps if you want the painting to go smoothly.

1   Empty the Room

Ideally, it would be good to have an empty room to make a painting job proceed much more efficiently. This is the reason why when you do construction or renovations, it is best to do the painting before you bring in the furniture and home accessories.

However, if you are painting your walls and ceilings while you’re living in the apartment and there is nowhere else to store your furniture, you can move these to the center of the room away from the walls, then cover them with a drop cloth or old bed sheets.

If you get the room ready as described here, then cleaning up after painting will be relatively easy.

2   Gather Your Supplies

Have all your supplies in the room before you start painting. Put old cartons or newspapers on the floor to put your supplies on so just in case you make a mess with open paint cans, then the mess does not go on your floor.

3   Remove Outlet and Switch Covers

If it is easy for you to remove the outlet and switch covers, do so. Put all the screws and covers in a paper bag so you don’t lose any of them, and it will be easier for you to find everything when you’re ready to put them all back.

However, if you find it hard to remove these things, then cover them with painter’s or masking tape. For some, this is a more painstaking process. You may get tempted to skip this step, especially if you are confident you have a steady hand. Still, it is better to be safe than do more clean-up work. You may still be able to get the paint marks out but clean-up will be more messy compared to just removing the tape you placed over the covers.

4   Apply Putty to Make Surface Smooth

Apply putty on any nail holes or dents on your surface. If you have a smooth surface, then you have a smooth paint finish. It’s that simple.

Let the putty dry for two hours then sand lightly.

5   Dust the Walls

To remove any (sanding) dust, wipe your wall with a rag or with a dry pad installed at the end of a long handle to reach the upper part of the wall.

6   Put a Protective Cover on the Floors

Use cardboard or old newspapers to cover your floors. Make sure these are flush against the walls. You can secure them with tape to prevent them from shifting underfoot. Protecting your floors from paint drips will make clean-up easier for you.

7   Tape Adjacent Walls

For an adjacent wall that you don’t want painted with the same color, tape the edge of that wall that is not going to be painted. Again, some experts do not bother with this step. But then these people have practiced painting surfaces so often that they have perfected the art.

It helps if you have a good brush, the right brush, the right amount of paint on the brush, the right flick of the wrist, the right pressure…

Just tape the adjacent wall.

There you go, 7 simple steps to do before you start painting a room. Just like surface preparation, preparing the room before painting will make your painting job a more efficient exercise. Definitely you won’t have any regrets like removing paint from expensive furniture, or having the need to get down on your knees to clean up those paint spills and splatters.

Do you need inspiration on the colors you can use for your room? Surf through the articles you will find in our color inspirations section.