It doesn’t matter if you are a DIY newbie or a master painter, you should find at least one of these tips useful. I have never been good at any form of DIY, so I went looking for professional painting tips and tricks. With this advice, you should be able to paint any wall, ceiling or surface effortlessly and cleanly. Each tip is from a fully qualified painting and decorator, making each one well worth reading…

Avoid Those Lap marks

Have you ever notices strange stripes on your painted walls? This is what is called Lap Marks and it is caused by you applying uneven laters of paint to that part of the wall. The way to get rid of this is to make sure each stroke of your paint roller overlaps the previous one. That way you will always keep that wet edge and it should spread the pain out much more evenly.

Clean Your Walls Before Painting

Many people already do this, but it is something even some professionals still don’t do in order to save time. But if you want the best looking walls you should be rubbing them down with some sugar soap in a bucket of water. Fully rise out the sponge each time you dip it into the water and gently rub the walls to make sure all the dirt or dust is gone.

A Cheap Brush is a Bad Brush

You might think all painting and decorating brushes are the same, so it doesn’t matter how much you pay for them. But this is simply not true with finer, more expensive paint brushes making your wall painting much smoother and more even layer in terms of the amount of paint applied.

Only Look at Paint Testers in The Sunlight

So you consider yourself a bit of a painting guru and even buy small tester pots before getting a bigger pot. But you will be surprised at how often people are disappointed or at the very least shocked at the colour the paint ends up being. This is because they didn’t look at the tester patch in pure sunlight. It’s no good turning the light on or shining a torch on it because direct sunlight will often bleach the colour making it look much lighter than it already was.

Think About Paint Quality, not Paint Price

You might think the cheaper a tin of paint is the thinner it will be, but that is not always the case. Sure, getting a thick pot of paint might mean you only have to apply a few layers, but even some cheaper paints are the same consistency, so do examine the thickness of each paint and not go by what brand it is.

Don’t Overload The Paint

The most common error many home DIY painters will do is to overload the roller or brush. When it comes to brushes you should be dipping them into the paint to the point that it is roughly half the length of the brushes bristles. And when it comes to rollers that flat bit of the painting tray is there for a reason and you should be doing a dip and roll-off method.

Stir More Than Once

While most people will stir the paint at least once at the start of a job you should be stirring the paint every hour or so just to keep the colour mixture the same. As you paint the surface you might also displace dust and dirt that will go onto the tip skim of the paint, but giving it a stir will keep your next brush clean.

Do Stop

If you want to make sure your walls don’t end up patchy you need to make sure you try and to a whole surface in one go. You don’t have to paint a whole room in one sitting, but by finishing off the surface/side, you are making the paint job look even.

Mask it and Remove It

Most DIY painting jobs will see you need to use masking tape, but what you might not know is that you should be putting it down and pulling it back off as soon as you can rather than letting it dry and settle. This is because letting the paint dry will often lead to tearing in the paint leaving a much more jagged edge.

Top Down

You will be shocked at how many times people have painted the walls before the ceiling, then ended up having to repaint the walls because of paint splatter. It doesn’t matter what you do painting a ceiling will inevitably mean paint ends up on the walls, so do the ceilings first, then the walls.

Do you have any other tips for making sure your painted walls look amazing? If you do why not tell us about them in the comments below.