Dulux’s Creative Director, Marianne Shillingford, shares her four top tips on what to think about when it comes to creating your ideal space.
1. The legwork
Order testers of your favourite colours and try them out on the walls. Buying good quality brushes and roller sleeves will help make the job easier and they are also easy to clean in water, meaning they will last for all your future decorating projects.
Ensure you have everything you need before you start decorating so you don’t waste valuable time at the shops while you could be painting.
2. Understand the different types of paint
Water-based matt emulsion is very smooth and helps to hide imperfections on walls.
Satin and silk reflect some light so these walls look like slightly polished surfaces, however they are much easier to clean than a matt finish and so are highly practical. But silk and satin have a tendency to show up more imperfections so this is something to consider if your walls are less than perfect.
A satin finish on woodwork gives a softer appearance and can hide imperfections. An eggshell finish is somewhere between matt and a silk finish and gives a very classic look to woodwork. It is also used on walls if you like a tough finish. Quick drying satin or gloss can be used for the woodwork such as skirting boards, window frames and doors.
3. Learn the finish
Using different sheen levels in the same colour as a decorative technique is subtle and clever. It’s also easy because any little mistakes between areas of different sheen are hard to spot.
Try painting the bottom third of the walls in soft sheen and the top two thirds in flat matt. It looks amazing and people will give you a lot of credit. It’s perfect if you want to have an effect that comes to life as you move through the space as the light changes throughout the day.
4. Be brave
The biggest mistake I ever made was to be cautious. I painted my small sitting room white because it was small and I wanted it to look bigger. It did look bigger but it was cold and unwelcoming – we never sat in it.
One day I decided to be brave and painted it in the darkest shade of ‘Cherry Chocolate’. The effect was instant. Everything looked amazing in the space and it was so cosy. We use it every night and I vow never to paint a room white ever again.
This post was provided by Dulux.
