Preparing to Paint- Tips for Preparing for your Painting Project

Preparing properly for your painting project will help make your painting project successful! Preparing the room you will be painting in and the walls you will be painting on can take an entire day in itself depending on the size of the room. It’s a good idea to set aside an entire day, or at least a few good for smaller jobs to get all the preparation completed.

Move furniture to the middle of the room and cover with plastic tarps. Try to avoid moving furniture out of the room because you could end up bumping and scratching your newly painted walls when moving the furniture back into the room.

Remove nails, tacks, tape or anything else on the walls.

Wash the walls that you’ll be painting. This is an important step as paint does not adhere well to dirty, dusty walls. This doesn’t mean that you have to get out a hose and power wash your walls! Just get a sponge (or a mop which will make it easy to reach the upper walls) and a bucket and a gentle household cleaner (even soap will do the trick) and make sure that you wash all areas of the walls. You can let the walls air dry.

Consider opening up a window to increase your ventilation from the sanding and scraping you’ll be doing. It’s a good idea to also keep the windows open while painting.

For glossy or nonporous surfaces, lightly sand the wall to a dull finish or use an abrasive cleanser.

Patch it up! There are no shortcuts when it comes to painting! You will need to patch up any cracks, holes or other problem areas on your walls and pay close attention to not miss any small holes from nails etc.

Caulk up any gaps between walls, ceilings, crown moldings or other interior trim.

Cover light fixtures (or remove them if it’s not too complicated) but be sure to remove the light bulbs if you do cover them up.

Remove drapes, curtains etc.

Remove hardware and electrical covers from around the room. It’s much easier to remove hardware then to risk dripping on it and having to deal with the mess. Plus, your painting will look better and it will be easier for you to paint as opposed to painting around the hardware and electrical covers. A good tip to remember to avoid confusion later is to label each hardware piece in a small plastic bag along with its screws etc. It will make putting them back up later a lot easier.

Carefully place painters tape (the blue tape you can get at any hardware or painting supply store) around doors, windows etc.

Cover floors with a drop cloth or plastic tarp. Tape the tarps down to the floor so they won’t keep moving around on you!

Prepare all your tools in the middle of the room for easy access.

Get ready for cleanup before the cleanup! Make sure you have numerous rags available as well as razor blades which will help you to scrape paint away.

Consider using a primer. Primers are a great way to help your walls look even better and will help your paint stick better too. Some primers are even specially formulated to cover stains and discolorations, block out odors, fill and level out uneven surfaces and more. Sometimes taking the extra step for priming can really be to your advantage, so consider it before you get started with your painting.

Tool/Supply Checklist:

It will get you off to a fantastic start to have all of the following tools prepared:

Roller
Brushes
Bucket
Screen (to place inside the bucket to wipe excess paint off the roller)
Roller tray
Stirrer
Roller cover
Blue Tape (painters tape)
Hole Filler
Spackling
Sand Paper
Screwdriver (for removing hardware)
Sponges
Primers
Putty knife
Razor blades
Rags
Plastic drop cloth
Canvas drop cloth

The number of tools that you will absolutely need to have depends on the size and type of your painting job but you will definitely want to be prepared and have everything at your hands reach in the center of the room.

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