Can anyone tell me what has happened to my newly (professionally) painted walls?

[Sandcaaarstle]

Just had my lounge painted. It was silk emulsion and I didn’t fancy panting it myself with Matt emulsion. I’ve come home from work today (it was finished yesterday afternoon) and looks like this. What do I do now?
I’ve attached photos but might not upload for a while.

Not primed properly. Should have been sanded, sugar-coated then primed before painting matt over silk. Matt paint is a bitch, silk will go over anything but matt is a pita.

She’s going to come back and have a look at it and try to sort. She was as shocked as I was.

You need the correct undercoat before painting new paint/ colour. F and B sell different kinds of undercoat for different paints/ colours. We once didn’t bother as it’s quite pricey but ended up having to redo it all.

Not me haha. The living room also had what felt like 20 layers of wall paper when we stripped that. All the previous occupants must of just wall papered over the existing wallpaper.

At some point someone laid laminate over the upstairs carpets poorly. The bathroom was also carpeted. Very much slum landlord so we didn’t feel too bad 😅 last I checked it was still a rental over charging and doing nothing to the property.

She’s said she’s going to do this then paint again and see if it fixes it.

I bloody despise silk emulsion, I don’t know why anyone uses it 😭

Not that it helps you @Sandcaaarstle but we also paid for a so called reputable decorator, and the job they did was shocking.

I hope you get it sorted.

Thanks @HappiestSleeping

she seemed genuinely upset and replied straight away. I’m sure (hope to god) she’ll fix it!

Sounds like you have a more diligent decorator than we did.

Also, yours looks like a genuine error. Mine was just plain shoddy work.

This exact thing happened to us. It was a wall with wallpaper on it previously. Your lucky your painter is coming back, my painter told me to have a go myself since I did such a good job upstairs 😳

As someone who used to sell and mix paint, I don't know why anyone uses matt. It's fragile, easily marked, always looks grubby and you get problems like this when putting it on basically anything. Give me a decent silk any day.

It happens if you put matt emulsion over gloss paint too. My DM's kitchen had taht problem years ago.

Sympathy! The paint in every room in our house is not only crackled but also peels off like a face mask if you try and paint over it 😭

I would be spending hours peeling that weirdly satisfying. Not when you want to look nice however.

If they sanded the walls, which you said they did, then this should have nothing to do with the silk emulsion. It looks like the cracking you get when paint is either applied too thickly, re-coated before first coat has dried or dried too quickly from over heating (near radiators or heaters or dehumidifiers used to speed up drying time). Any of that possible?

I hate matt paint, can't stand the feel of it. Silk is so much nicer to touch and doesnt show marks as easy

Silk is a nightmare to paint over. It’s like water on oil. You need to do a very good job sanding over the silk surface to give it a ‘key’ to paint over it with matte, beyond the usual prep. If you don’t it either peels or crackles. You can use a primer but I’ve always gone with the first option.

the decorators should have known this; there’s no way to mistake silk emulsion on the walls for anything else.

Definitely not over heated and no dehumidifier. They put a coat on on Monday and it was fine. Then when they finished on Tuesday it looked amazing (I don’t know if they gave it one or two coats yesterday). Today it’s all cracked 🙁

"She". Wonder if she's on here? 👀 Good news that she's going to fix it.

Was it painted on fresh plaster? If so, it hasn’t been sized properly prior to painting and the moisture has been sucked from the paint.

Its called crazing. And its usually when a paint like vinyl silk is painted over a surface that hasn't been prepped properly and is painted over wallpaper paste remnants.
The new wet coat causes the dry underneath to expand, which when it dries itself, will cause the top layer to crack and shrink.
Paint Zissner peel stop over it, allow to dry fully then recoat with paint of your choice.

I had this after painting normal matt emulsion over one coat matt emulsion.

I painted new plaster with normal emulsion (forgot to let it down that time 😂) and it was absolutely fine.

Never seen anything like that happen before at all 😳

Silk is a nightmare.

Thank you. This makes sense. I wonder if the previous owners didn’t prep the wall properly when they painted with silk. It wouldn’t surprise me. Their DIY skills in the rest of the house are questionable. And they’ve painted every single surface throughout in silk (including ceilings).

I might have to use lining paper in the rest of the house 🙈

I agree. It’s bloody awful to look at too. Why anyone would want shiny walls and ceilings is beyond me 🤦🏼‍♀️