Home Style and Faux Painting in St. Louis

Painting your St. Louis home is one of the effective way of enhancing the aesthetics and atmosphere of your house. Through a decorative painting technique such as Faux painting, a certain house may become even more stylish and classy. Surely a house decorated with faux painting will stand out from the rest of its neighborhood.

Faux painting utilizes several techniques to achieve the desired effect and decoration. One effect is painting stripes. It is one of the most popular faux techniques that can add the visual appeal to any space. Stripes are created with the use of masking tapes or painter's tape. The width of the stripes can be adjusted by setting the distance between the tapes. Although taping itself requires considerable time and effort, the resulting effects once the painting job I completed will surely be worth the effort.

Sponge painting is recommended for those who are allergic to painter' tape or for those with limited patience in taping. By sponging, a porous surface may have additional surface texture and depth. This is achieved by first applying a single color onto the surface then sponging another paint of different color over the first layer of paint. The sponge effect can have varies results depending on the type of sponge utilized, how wet the sponge is with paint and how well the paint blends with the sponge. Two techniques are actually used in sponge painting. Sponging on, as in applying the glaze to the walls with the sponge which creates a more porous and mottled look. Sponging off, applying the glaze to the surface with a roller and removing the desired amount with the sponge, creates a more subtle and textured appearance. Paint products which may be used for both techniques are latex semi-gloss paint (the base color) and faux technique glaze (the complimenting color).

Color Washing is one of the easiest decorative painting technique which provides an alluring worn look. A weathered stucco look is resembled by the visibly overlapping brush strokes of color washing. Different color wash effects may be attained by use of different materials such as a brush, a sponge, a rag or a cloth. Imperfect or slightly damaged walls are ideally applied on with color washing to give it a subtle texture finish which not only hides the flaws but also catches the attention. Yellow, orange, red and other bright colors are best for use in color washing.

Rag painting is done in a similar way as sponge painting, the only difference is that a rag is utilized instead of a sponge. Like sponging, rag painting is also done either by ragging on where the glaze is applied to the wall with a rag, or by ragging off with the glaze is applied to the wall by a roller then removed from the wall with a rag. The base color is allowed to be shown through and thus create a textured and speckled surface by ragging on. Whereas a slightly more subtle finished look is achieved by ragging off.

In Rag Rolling, which is a by-product of rag painting, a special application roller is used to create a distinct surface with textured appearance and additional depth. This effect is perfect on flawed walls. Metallic and pearlescent glazes may be experimentally utilized in rag rolling.

Call your St. Louis painting contractor for these and many more styles.