It has been an unusually busy Summer for Paint It!, with several fun projects back to back. I can never predict how busy or slow I will be during July and August. There are summers where clients are all away and just not thinking of home improvements, and then there are summers like this one, where many want the work done while they are away, so they can return to a freshly painted and decorated home. One of the jobs I am currently working on, is just such a case. I love all the architectural details in this grand home. It’s a typical two family found in Somerville, MA, but rare in the fact that previous owners left all the beautiful woodwork intact, and all the original stain glass windows are in great shape.
When I first arrived at this home, all the walls in this foyer had very old, dark wallpaper and some terrible lighting. The wallpaper has now been removed and the walls have been painted a soft white. The ceilings also had that terrible popcorn texture, so were changed out to smooth panels.
My job is to paint the three ceiling panels a light metallic green and add a custom designed repeat pattern to 5 areas on the walls. The design was adapted from a wallpaper pattern the homeowner loved, but felt it would be too much to have all the walls covered with this wallpaper. Instead, she opted to have me adapt the design and hand paint it on the walls, like art work. The design will appear in 5 different areas in this foyer, and will be painted with the same light green metallic paint as the ceiling.]
Initially, I was going to just transfer the design I drew on paper to the walls, but when I did some samples in my studio, the graphite from the transfer kept blending with the light green metallic paint, making it very dirty looking. The design was such that a traditional stencil could not be cut. I ended up transferring the design to a large piece of mylar and cutting small dashes, outlining the design. This actually went much quicker than it sounds and since I was repeating this design 5 times, plus each panel would have 1 full repeat in the center, and an half repeat above and below that, it was worth the effort.
I marked my template with horizontal and vertical center lines, and did the same on each of the 5 wall panels, using a watercolor pencil. Now it was quite quick and easy to just tape up the template and mark through the cut out dashes with a watercolor pencil. Once all my patterns were on the wall, using an artist angle brush, I set about painting the designs.
None of the lighting has been installed in the ceiling yet, as I still have to do my thing there, so I only have a utility light set up. I will photograph more of this foyer when it is complete. I love this very contemporary look against the old woodwork.
A Great Tip
