Drywall and paint

Back at the end of September we had the drywall done. It was a radical transformation of the inside. It was also something of an experience to see all my labor at electrical and plumbing concealed for the next fifty years (hopefully).

The drywallers did an excellent job.

The best part: I didn’t have to do it! Doing this addition mostly DIY taught me a lot about the value of labor. I actually enjoy doing drywall, but it is a very time-consuming process for me and it was totally worth it to have a crew come in and hang everything in one day, then tape everything in one day, then spend a few hours texturing over two or three days. If I had done it, it would have taken weeks.

After the drywall was finished we went on our fall camping trip to the Chiricahuas. Upon our return, it was time to start painting.

Painting is simple. If there was ever an easy DIY home improvement job, painting is it. Easy-peasy, right? Well, for me, not so much.

My mistake: using a tinted primer under a light-colored clay paint.

So I had lots of leftover tinted grey primer from doing the house exterior. We used AFM Safecoat primer, which is safe for use both inside and outside. I needed to prime the drywall to control the dust and make painting easier, right? So the entire bathroom got a beautiful coat of blue-grey primer.

We decided to use Bioshield clay paint and then seal it with a tinted glaze. So we ordered a bunch of clay paint samples and some glaze, then drove over to Originate to pick up some pigment and mica flakes for the glaze. We spent quite a bit of time figuring out what combination of paint and glaze we wanted, but settled on a paint called Mezzo Polar with a clear mica glaze on the ceiling and a turquoise/mica glaze on the walls.

I ordered two gallons of paint, thinking two coats should be sufficient to cover everything. Wrong! After two coats, you can still see the primer underneath! Plus, two gallons wasn’t enough to do two coats on all surfaces. So I’ve ordered a third gallon for a third coat. My plan is to apply the third coat to the ceiling (which is getting the clear glaze), and spot-correcting the walls where the second coat looks too thin. Hopefully the pigmented glaze will blend everything together so the primer won’t be visible through the paint anymore.

Don’t get me wrong: the clay paint is awesome. I love it. It is fun to work with and easy to clean up. Just don’t put a tinted primer under it unless you are using a dark paint color! It’s too expensive and time consuming to have to do extra coats.