How To Paint Stripes

The office painting is finished, and we couldn't be happier with the outcome. It is so nice walking by the room now and not seeing this:

Melissa Young Photo

But instead seeing this:

obviously not a Melissa Young Photo:)

The whole atmosphere and feel of the room has changed drastically. Its like all of a sudden I can feel calm and have peace in my office, instead of feeling like I am in a circus {or as my friend Kylie says, in Blue Clues}

Here is how we accomplished the stripes with only a few glitches:

• First things first, putty any holes:

• Then if you are like us and are painting over stripes that are vertical, and are going to paint horizontal, we highly suggest you lightly sand down the previous lines of stripes, since there is an edge between the colors. This way you don't have to worry about seeing lines in the opposite direction on your new paint:

• Skip above step if simply painting over a sold color. Next up, paint the trim edges a fresh coat of white. This will guarantee you to not have any remaining old paint on your new wall:

• This step was my favorite guys, ready? Laugh until you cry at what you find in your old house. I guess J had seen this before because he painted the office all alone last time, but this was my first glimpse at true wallpapering pink painted beauty:

• Prime the walls

• Next, start painting your main wall shade, we chose Powdered Snow by Behr Ultra. I'm pretty sure y'all don't need directions on how to paint a solid color, right?

• Once the main color completely dries, start the insane taping process. We got smart this time and used a laser level from Home Depot for our lines. Last time we did stripes we used a large level and penciled in the line, this was much easier. Also, by not having to actually mark anything-it eliminates the chance that pencil shows through. Almost all laser levels automatically stick to walls so just one person can do the job, unless you have insanely textured walls {like we do} then it doesn't stick and requires two people. Boo. We would mark the line with a pencil, use the level, and apply the tape directly to wall matching it up to the level line.

See what I mean by textured?!

We paid $20 for our level, and it is/was worth every penny! We spaced our stripes

12 1/2 inches apart, which in our room equaled pretty thick stripes. We arrived at this length by first measuring the wall between the base board and crown. Next we figured out how many lines of each color we wanted, we chose to have 4 white and 3 tan, so 7 total, then just divide the wall length by the number of line 88/7 = roughly 12.5 {the bottom section is actually 13", but no one has notice..yet}

When you are taping the lines be sure you are allowing the section you are painting to have the full measure uncovered, so alternate which side of the line you tape. For example, on the very top of the top line we tape on the top of the level line, then go down 12.5" and tape on the bottom level line. Alternate between the top and bottom for each line. Do this for each line.

• Once tape is up, then seal the tape down by painting your main color paint over the tape sections that the stripe color will go in. This makes sure that you get that super crisp line, even with ugly textured walls. Here is an example:

See how the tape is above and below the line.....this is very important!!!!

• Once that sealing swipe of paint is dried, time to paint the stripes in. J marked all the areas that I was not supposed to paint, just so I couldn't screw it up, he Adrianne proofed it. I think we can all manage that, especially since the prep is the hardest part! For the color of the stripes we choose Natural Choice by Sherwin Williams {see our process for choosing this color here}.

• Then comes the fun part, pulling off the tape, while simultaneously praying that the lines are perfect. Unfortunately for us, with the walls being disgustingly textured, we weren't able to get a perfect corner paint on every corner. So there was a little touch-up involved. I was ok with it though, because it took me a total of 10 minutes to touch it up and leave it perfect!

We are so happy with how they turned out. Here is an after shot, but the office is clearly not even put back together here, much less truly 'made-over'....that is to come:):)

Hope this tutorial helps all the amazing readers that said they were going to be doing stripes soon! Its a process, but it is beyond worth it!

<3,
Adri

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