Farrow & Ball versus Dulux Diamond Matt

[mylaptop]

We'll soon be painting our kitchen, and someone has recommended a Farrow & Ball paint colour that I really like. However, I'm worried about its resilience and wipeability in a kitchen. I'm thinking of using Dulux Trade's colour mixing service to find something similar in their Diamond Matt finish because I have that on my staircase and know it can be wiped down well to remove dirty fingerprints etc. But I don't know how close a colour match will be possible and what else I'd be losing (if anything) by making the shift. Is there anything that gives F&B paint an edge in decisions like this?

Professional decorators hate F&B in my experience. I’ve done what you suggest several times and the results are good. Possibly not identical but good enough for me and I’m quite picky!

YABU

Farrow and ball colours are beautiful but from personal experience (mine) and profession (dad is painter and decorator) not ideal in high traffic areas due to its ultra matt finish.
I've never used dulux diamond matt so can't comment on that, dulux dcolour match is hit and mix, it spits out the closest dulux colour and whilst there are thousands it isn't always a perfect match. However if there is a paint shop near which does either Johnstone or Leyland trade mix they can match F&B colours with a very high degree of accuracy

F&B is good quality but expensive. We have started to colour match to Valspar (B&Q) Premium v500, it's half the price of F&B, colours so far have been identical (we've used Pointing, Ammonite, School House White, Downpipe and Nancy's Blushes) and have even used it to touch up walls with real F&B paint and you can't tell the difference. It has primer in it too and the quality is perfect.

Extra note to defend my dad as this usual painter and decorators hate F&B have started - he doesn't hate F&B. He rates it very highly as does other p&d he knows and works with. However..
It needs several coats to achieve an even flat matt finish which is extra time for the painter and cost to the client, most think he is taking the piss when he says this and thinks he's quoting extra because he doesn't like the paint.
Also, the high pigmentation whilst giving beautiful colours means the paint can look totally different on different walls and throughout the day as the sunlight moves across the room, it can look very different to pictures or the colour chips for example. So if someone has picked a colour off the chart and not bought a tester pot they can be pretty disspointed they've just paid £40+ a tin and it's not what they were expecting. Will they blame themselves for not buying several tester pots and painting lengths of lining paper, blue tacking them to the wall and movi g it around so they can see what it looks like on different walls and different times of the day? Or do they accuse the p&d of buying the wrong colour. ..

Be careful with colour-matching. I got a match for Purbeck Stone and it was way too blue- I ended up having to rush out and buy the F&B, so the whole thing was an expensive experiment.

F&B has a wipeable finish, it’s called modern emulsion. Not as flat as estate emulsion, but I wouldn’t call it shiny. I haven’t tested it personally, so not sure how good it it. Valspar matches better than Dulux IME.

@MatildaTheCat

Professional decorators hate F&B in my experience. I’ve done what you suggest several times and the results are good. Possibly not identical but good enough for me and I’m quite picky!

Exactly that. One of the first things our decorator said to me was “Please don’t choose F&B, it’s awful to work with”.

Little Greene is much better to apply than F&B and is very wipeable - has a similar effect and similar colour range so could be worth checking out. IMO the colour matching might do well at matching the shade but possibly not the texture which is quite a bit of the overall effect.

Valspar colour matches are, in my experience, appalling - come out waaaayyy off. I recommend Decorating Centre Online - independent small business with a huge amount of knowledge and the matches I’ve had have been bang on - not just F&B either.

Op I hope you don't mind me asking about another paint company. I'm trying to make my mind up about paint. Can anyone tell me what Little Greene paint is like please?

@SacreBleeurgh

Valspar colour matches are, in my experience, appalling - come out waaaayyy off. I recommend Decorating Centre Online - independent small business with a huge amount of knowledge and the matches I’ve had have been bang on - not just F&B either.

Maybe depends how their colour reader is calibrated? Or maybe I’m lucky with my local shop - though they were not colour mixing last time I went so might not even be doable.

I have tried many different brands and always regret when I don’t use F&B.

I honestly don’t get why some have issues with applying f&b paints. I’m not a professional but I have decorated several of my own properties and always find f&b gives the loveliest end result. Nothing else ever quite does as well.

We have f&b modern emulsion in our bathroom and it is wipeable. Elsewhere in our house we use estate emulsion and it is very easy to touch up if necessary.

Worth saying I never use rollers. Always high quality brushes.

@tywysoges

F&B has a wipeable finish, it’s called modern emulsion. Not as flat as estate emulsion, but I wouldn’t call it shiny. I haven’t tested it personally, so not sure how good it it. Valspar matches better than Dulux IME.

@tywysoges thanks. I'm a bit confused about the F&B finishes tbh. There is a page on their website which lists them, including two emulsions (modern and estate) but they don't appear in the drop-down selection box on the paint colour page - there are 2 eggshells, a gloss, and something mysteriously called "dead flat". Is that just another name for their estate emulsion?

We have the modern F&B in high traffic areas, it has a slight sheen (not as much as a silk paint) and is wipeable. The decorator said it was great to work with, quick to go on, and he used less than expected. Maybe we were lucky?

@Satsuma2

Op I hope you don't mind me asking about another paint company. I'm trying to make my mind up about paint. Can anyone tell me what Little Greene paint is like please?

I've used Little Greene, Crown, Dulux and F&B and the best is Little Greene by far IMO. Their Intelligent Matt Emulsion is incredibly hard wearing and wipeable and the colours are as good as F&B while being much easier to work with. It's more expensive than Crown or Dulux, but it's lasted much longer than the Crown did, so not more expensive in the long run.

Not really adding anything useful here, except this advert popped up for me on this thread

@mylaptop are you painting wood? The emulsions only appear if you pick walls and ceiling from the first drop down menu.

[quote tywysoges]@mylaptop are you painting wood? The emulsions only appear if you pick walls and ceiling from the first drop down menu.[/quote]
Ah, I see! I didn't consciously choose wood so it must have somehow defaulted to that. Got it now.

Little Green paint is brilliant.

I have turned into a paint snob now and won't use anything else. Wonderful depth of pigment, very easy and smooth to apply, long lasting, colour true...what's not to like?

Paint mixing tends to be better for lighter colours & quite a bit out for darker colours. Avoid valspar, johnstones is great. I hate F&B paint after a disaster this year with an very dark eggshell (water based) that just wouldn't dry despite perfect prep & conditions. 3 days and it was still tacky. The F&B ship refunded and sheepishly said their dark colours can sometimes take up to 14 days to dry! Never again. Little Greene all the way.

I use f&b modern eggshell and it's lovely to work with. It does have a bit of a sheen though. I have matched with various brands before and although okay I don't find you get the lovely tone of the f&b paints. Sometimes to save money I do the first coat in a matched paint and the final coat in f&b.

I'm about to decorate a massive 2 story barn living room and I want strong white by F&B - my decorated sais the sulus match is good for that shade . I'm using curator paint
On my feature wall but it's ££££

Dulux