Interior paint for a period house??

[AndOnAndOnAndOn]

Have just bought an 18th century house and am thinking about redecorating, do we need to use any special paint? Someone told us not to use anythign that was oil based, something to do with letting the house 'breathe'. So what would you use? Farrow and ball, or just any water based emulsion? (thinking of the ££ here!)

earthborn paints.

Not cheap but no VOC's. Beautiful chalky colours

link here

Generally, you should be fine with almost any paint in an 18C house - esp if it is brick/stone built. And if it has been replastered in the last 20 years (unless iit's v v listed and has been restored under the eye of English Heritage) it won't be breathing much anyway.

It's only worth worrying if it's built out of something a bit more unusual - in which case I'd get a specialist decorator to come and advice.

Thanks for the link Laurie, can feel paint buying related bankruptcy coming on!

That's useful Vonsud, I think it's just normal brick built, but I didn't really understand about the house breathing (unless it's alive...) It is listed but only grade 2 so not spectacularly so.

oh just looking at the paint card - lovely colours! seagull, cricket and a couple others look just the sort of thing I had in mind.

Dulux and Crown both do great period ranges - you need to go to a trade supplier to get to see the Dulux range though. We've always used the Crown period range on our house (built 1840) and they've given that wonderfully matt, chalky look.

FIL is a painter/ decorator and he thinks F&B is utter shoite - really poor quality paint.

Farrow and Ball

dont be fooled into buying one of the highstreet period paints (dulux etc) you wont get the same finish as something like f and b and the co its a false economy. also with f and b you actually need less paint than high street copies so whilst more expensive initially it evens out. other paints for a period feel are www.thelittlegreene.com/ but more expensive than f and b.

My FIL would whole-heartedly disagree with you HH lol

well, my opinion is based on personal experience and my own decorators thoughts, but thats not to say it is right!

My FIL does come from the North West though, so I suspect he thinks that F&B is a load of southern softy nonsense (he likes to keep tabs on his spending)!

I've never understood why people say F&B paints are rubbish quality, I've always found them to be brilliant. Our whole house is F&B and i've never needed to do more than 2 coats

I would receommend fired earth we are in a georgian listed property and they have some lovely colours with same finishs as F&B which don't mark any where near as easily as F&B and thats comiing from doing homes in both! I would always go for FE now. have to say though for high traffic areas I used Dulux diamond matt which my builder sourced as trade for me - matt finish but wipeable - its fantastic

we have just bought an 18th C house too and I have learnt first hand about letting old houses breathe. we have layers of black mold to contend with due to the wrong things being used here - mainly wall paper though.
there is something you can add to paint to prevent it though.
will be using f&b here as i think the finish is really important.

Ok, you've just bought a period, listed house - this is the best piece of advice you are ever going to get.

Go on the SPAB weekend homeowners course. Do not buy anything until you've been on it.

You'll save an absolute fortune by doing this, and save a whole lot of stress. Seriously.

• - - -

Vonsudenfed is saying that you don't need to worry about buying breathable paint because the plaster will be modern and so not breathable, and the brick under it doens't need to breathe anyway. Thus you can slap anything on.

I don't know about C18 brick built buildings, but you can check on the SPAB website, or on www.periodproperty.co.uk. However, if you do have some lime plaster (which I do in my house), you may well need to keep it breathable, and that means using breathable paints like Earthborn's clay paint. We have some unimpressive damp patches in our house (but this is Stuart, so quite a bit older) caused by using the wrong paint.

Now, if anyone would like to buy the large pot of F&B 'Blue Ground' paint that I bought before going on the SPAB course, I'm open to offers. The tin is dented but it's totally unused. Gorgeous colour :-)

what's SPAB?

Ah - Society for the Preservation of Ancient Buildings. The ones that Prince Charles has just fallen out with .

Go on a SPAB course and you can persuade your conservation officers to let you do anything you like...

if you've got kids with sticky hands you might live to regret the chalky finish of farrow and ball.