How to Paint a Room, Correctly

If you want to know how to paint a room, you must first know how to properly lay the groundwork so that you can paint the room correctly. After comes the actual painting. Painting a room involves a lot of work in just setting up the area for painting. Without a correct set up, the room’s paint job will not look good. With your set up in place is when you can begin the painting process. You should first start with a good quality drywall primer, then paint.

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How to Paint a Room Summary

1. Lay the groundwork first
2. Use a quality primer
3. Paint

Setting up a Room for Painting

Laying the groundwork for painting a room involves removing obstacles, protecting areas from paint, cleaning walls, drywall repair, fixing baseboards, fixing trim, sanding, and one final cleaning. To begin the groundwork work for painting the room, you need to first remove as much stuff as you can:

remove any decorations from the room
remove the furniture from the room
remove the room’s outlet and light switch covers
and anything else you can think of

After the obstacles are out of your way, protect the areas of the room you don’t want to get any paint on. Then you can give the walls of the room a good cleaning. When your room’s walls are nice and clean, you can repair small and large damaged areas:

Fix holes on the room’s walls
Fix raised areas on the room’s walls (e.g., old paint drips)

Furthermore, you want to also repair the room’s trim and baseboards along with repairing the walls. When all of this is done, you can give the walls of the room a finial sanding. With the room’s walls sanded, give them a good final cleaning. The last step will be to tape off the repaired baseboards and trim. Now your room is properly set up in order to get an expert paint job.

Removing Obstacles from the Room and Paint Protection

Removing stuff out of your way will be a good first easy step in setting up a room for painting. This starts with furniture and decorations along with similar items in the room. Before removing the room’s electrical coverings such as covers for light switches and outlets, disconnect the electrical system for the specific room you will be painting in. Now that the electrical areas are safe, you can cover them with tape.

Good professional painter’s tape will stick and not leave any residue.

To protect the floors of the room, tape their edges down along the walls/ baseboards. Then you can cover the entire floor of the room with a protective material. Along with taping the edge of the floor, you can put tape on the room’s ceiling on the edge of the wall.

Cleaning the Drywall in the Room

With everything well protected, you can begin cleaning the room’s drywall. First, vacuum the edges and corners of the room. Your room’s walls are most likely drywall. Drywall is sensitive, so using a vacuum is a great way to avoid damaging the walls of the room when cleaning them. After the edges are cleaned, you can use a good quality dry dusting cloth to wipe down all the walls and trim in the room.

Repairing Wall Damage in the Room

The next step after cleaning will be repairing drywall damage in the room. You can get a repair kit to fix small holes. The kit should include the tools you need with a patching material. If you have larger damage on the room’s drywall, you will use drywall mud. For fixing raised areas, use a specific scraping tool to start. After you scrape it down, use a coarse piece of sandpaper to smooth it as much as possible. Get the raised areas as flush as possible.

Repairing the Room’s Trim

You need to repair the room’s walls before painting; however, you should also repair the trim and baseboards that are most likely in the room. The most common repair you will probably need to do is fill gaps between the trim and walls. For this repair, you can use caulking. Caulk the gaps and then use a soft 90-degree object to scrap off the excess caulking. You can also use a hard 90-degree object such as metal and just cover it with a cloth to make it soft.

Sanding the Room

Now that your room’s drywall is fixed, give the walls a finishing sanding job. A very fine grit sandpaper works well for this. Sanding creates particles, so be sure to use proper protections:

Use quality safety goggles
Use a quality n95 mask

To get a nice even sanding, use a circular motion.

Cleaning the Room’s Walls

After the finishing sanding is complete in the room, use a very damp cloth to clean the debris off the drywall. Water and drywall don’t mix well, so the less damp your cloth is the better. When you are done with the damp cloth, finish the job with a new completely dry cloth. Now your room’s walls are fully prepared for paining, after they are dried off of course.

Painter’s Tape

But before you paint the room, you will need to tape off the baseboards and trim. You will also need to tape off the area around the door. This needs to happen after the repairs you did are dried and set. You’ll be painting the room’s trim after you complete painting the walls, this is way they need to be taped off.

Finishing the Room’s Prep Work

With all this in place, your room is ready to be painted. You will have set up the room for painting by removing obstacles, protecting areas from paint, cleaning walls, drywall repair, fixing baseboards, fixing trim, sanding, and the one final cleaning. An awesome paint job for your room can only happen if the set-up work is done perfectly and there is a lot of set-up work that needs to happen. If the amount of set-up work overwhelms you or you really want the best paint job possible you should consult a painting professional.

How to Paint the Room

When you are done the set-up work is when you can begin painting the room. This will involve using a primer, then paint. A good quality primer will make the paint job look cleaner. Your first painting step should be using a brush for edges, then a roller for the large areas of the room.

Paint Primer

A proper primer is a great start to your room’s paint job. To get an even better paint job for the room, you can use a primer + sealer. A sealer has many properties. Two important sealer properties are its ability to go over different types of surface areas and make them even:

Different areas could be non-damaged drywall and the repaired areas.

The second property is that a good sealer will make your paint bond strongly to the wall. To begin the primer process, use a brush to get the primer on the corners and edges and a roller for the middle of the room’s walls. Then wait for the primer to dry and set.

The Start to Painting the Room

Now that the room has a good coat of primer you can begin painting the room. Before you get to the brush work, mix the paint well to get an even colour. For painting the edges, use a brush and put a little paint on the tip. This works for the primer also. After you have painted the edges and corners with a brush, use a roller for the large surface areas. As with the paint brush, don’t put too much paint on the roller. Let your room’s paint job dry and then give the room a second coat. Now you know how to paint a room. As mentioned before, for the best paint job possible, using a painting professional is always a great option.