Our dining room has always been a sore point for me. The previous owners used it as a playroom and it just had a normal builder type light fixture. Even worse the entryway had a horrible mirrored light so we found a much better option for both. Another issue is that it has carpet which will be changed out for hardwood or tile in the near future. I've wanted to paint for a long time. Actually I wanted to call our painter but that's neither here nor there. It was a dark green with a glaze and a lot of people liked it but I thought it make the small room feel too dark. I'm happy with the rest of the house so this seemed like an easy fix.
Picking a color is always the hardest part. I bought two different samples once I narrowed down the colors. I was originally going for green but wasn't really happy with them so thought maybe a blue green which are the accent colors in our kitchen. After doing much research online I found a Sherwin Williams color called Sea Mist which is supposed to be a pale gray with a hint of blue or green depending on the light. I sampled it and it seemed to go more to a light green but didn't test it on the wall because of the dark color. As you'll see I had a little panic going on while painting but more about that later.
The dreaded prep work is always so time consuming. First we washed and rinsed the walls with TSP. Definitely put down plastic drop cloths first. Al also gets painters tape that has plastic attached which are great but you'll still want something else for spills. The part we didn't consider when looking at this job was the chair rail which meant that each wall is twice the work because you have to cut in before rolling times two. He did use painters tape (the new kind that has a clean release or edge lock) but we bought good paint brushes made for cutting in so really didn't need it. He used some of the old painters tape in a couple of places and they kept ripping when we were taking it off so spend the little bit extra. We used Scotch Blue but Frog Tape is supposed to be really good also.
We bought good quality primer and paint from Sherwin Williams. Because of the dark color & glaze we had to use 2 coats of the primer. It was tinted and to extend it a little more since we were running out we mixed in my little sample jar as well. It's always a little bit scary when you first paint and you're looking at it wet because you can see all the brush and roller marks but once it's dry it looks great. We ended up getting the Sea Salt in SW Emerald which is one of their high end paints. It paid off because we only needed one coat.
One cleaning tip we learned from seeing Brian Santos (author of Paint Secrets) at a home show is to use some liquid fabric softener mixed with warm water (about 1/2 cup per gal) in a bucket to easily clean your brush. If course if you're not done you can wrap your brush in a plastic wrap or a bag and put in the fridge.
Now about the color. It's way more blue than I expected and even though I did a sample it's different when it's on the walls. It took me a few days to adjust although I was happy having a lighter color right away. The room is so much brighter now. Now I need to figure out some accessories. It's more of a blue green so is tricky. I have a couple of ideas that I'll share later when we get to the furniture refinishing. I'll probably be doing it before the floor is done so will have 2 more parts to the dining room saga.
Tip: Painting first is a big no no so learn from my mistake. Decide on your color scheme and look for fabric & accessories first. It's much easier to match or contrast a paint than it is to find fabric in the right color after the fact. I'm waiting now to decide on my furniture color before I worry about accessorizing.
