Painting walls

[Twospaniels]

I am redcorating a bedroom and want to use matt emulsion. However, the paint on the walls at the moment is silk finish.

Do I need to do anything before putting on the matt, or will it be ok?

You will have to give the walls a sand down, if you don't the silk will bubble, don't have to go mad, just until the shine is off most of it. 80 grit or 120 will be okay.

If you do have bits that bubble, just rub that back and just give that spot a lick of paint, in between your first and second coat is a good time to look around and spot if you've not got anywhere good enough.

Just a little P.S. for anyone else reading, please don't use silk paint, a good durable emulsion nowadays is better and much easier to work with and recoat over when the time comes.

people are under the illusion that silk paint will be more durable, and will wipe down easier etc

@LoveNote Oh for sure, and back in the day it was the way to go, but now modern durable paints are much much nicer to work with and probably more durable, the king of durable paints is Amphibolin from Caparol, but Johnstone's Acrylic Durable Matt or Crown Clean Extreme are still better choices than Silk. Sorry if i came across rude.

Thanks both. I guessed I was going to have to sand it down.

I put the silk on many years ago when it was all the rage 🤪.

More recenlty I’ve used matt that is washable. its much better.

Good to hear! Any electric sander you can buy is gonna be helpful, even an old school sanding pole will make it easier. Going too hard at one point and causing a lot of heat and it'll peel rather than sand so not too hard, 80 grit might be a bit beefy, 120 is always my go to. Sand before filling too, it's water that makes silk go funky.

If you wanna cheat try a wall or say 1m2 section so you can get a feel for how far you have to go.

I’d sand lightly first too. If I could be bothered.

As I’m lazy I’ve bought zinsser paint. (Not sure if I’ve spelled that correctly).

It’s supposed to be good at painting over any kind of paint without any issues. I’m using it over gloss that had emulsion and silk over it and it didn’t work well as water and oil based paints clash, and it had bubbled.

It’s dear but good for small areas presumably. £50 for 2.5litres I think.

That may not help you much if your walls are a large area but may be helpful if it’s just a small area.