Tuesday’s Tips ~ Sheens of Paints

Tomorrow we take possession of our new home. It’s exciting and daunting and totally overwhelming! 

And as I prepare for all the upcoming changes, one of the first things on our list is painting some rooms before new flooring is installed. At some point, every room of that house will be newly painted I’m sure! But for now, I just need to concentrate on a few. The first ones on our list: 

As I’m pouring over all my paint fan decks and dreaming in my head, I thought a great “Tuesday’s Tips” post would expand on one Jill did a few weeks ago. I often get the question, “What finish do we paint this wall, this room, etc.?” 

There are no rules, per-say, but here are my guidelines. I should preface this by saying that these are just my opinions and don’t reflect all paint manufacturing guidelines! These are the tips I would suggest to you if you were my client.

I personally don’t like a flat paint on any wall except on ceilings. For some reason, flat paint makes me feel like I can’t breathe. I know. Weird. It’s too chalky or something. It’s also not very user friendly if you need to wipe down a wall say to a dirty dog or messy tiny hand prints. It will leave a shiny spot where you have rubbed. However, after saying that, a flat paint is more contemporary at times and some designers and homeowners may disagree with me! 

Having two little guys and a giant dog in my house, I prefer a low sheen (the next one up from flat) on my walls. I like that there is just a tiny sheen to the paint and I love that I can actually wipe it down and there won’t be any changes to my paint. 

Some people go to the next sheen level in the bathroom and kitchen. I however, don’t like anything shinier on my walls than an eggshell or low sheen. The more sheen you have in your paint and on your walls, the more you will see every imperfection (cracks, texture, etc.). In our current house, we used Dunn Edwards paint in Velvet finish throughout and never had a problem with mildew and paint in either of those rooms. I do change it up though on the ceiling and do the eggshell/low sheen on the ceilings of these rooms. No flat in the bathroom and kitchen!

It’s all about the details when it comes to trims, so I like it to stand out a bit from the walls and ceiling. A semi-gloss or gloss on the trim just dresses it up a bit and makes it just a tad more special! 

Of course there are exceptions to every rule and guideline, but the guidelines above are what I tell clients and what I follow myself! 

I did find some great information on the Dunn Edwards website. Lots of great tips, including one on painting dark paneling that I read through! I will definitely be posting about this after I complete the makeover of our beautiful dark paneled new guest bedroom into something a bit lighter and more up to date!