Finding good workers to handle jobs around the house can be quite difficult; you know this as a fact if you’ve tried hiring someone based on an ad or a telephone book listing, and ended up with a horror story. Many of us turn to doing it ourselves, and one of the most basic jobs to handle on your own is house painting, interior-style. Most of your time will be occupied in prep; this is the secret to great painting. Obviously, choosing high-quality materials and a good color are also key ingredients, but maybe even less so than prepping your room properly.

So how do you do it? Well, start by moving the furniture. If you can’t get it all out of the room in question, then gather it all up in the middle of the room, leaving the walls as free from encumbrance as possible.

Tarp the furniture mound with high quality visqueen, or plastic sheeting, making sure no bare edges peep out. Next, take care of your floor or carpeting in a similar way. You can buy a painting tarp that is coated on one side so as not to allow any drips to soak through. Remove all switch plate covers, ceiling fans (if you’re doing the ceiling), door knobs, etc. — basically, anything that is between your brush and the bare wall.

Blue painter’s tape can be your biggest friend if you use it correctly. Again, spend as much time as possible taping off securely the things that you want to paint around: this might be crown molding, floor boards or door trim. Use your finger nail to get as clean and tight a seal as possible. If you’re a better than average painter, then high quality paint and a good 1 1/4″ brush, angled slightly, will be enough to freehand the cut-in job you’ll have to do. Paint the corner seams in the wall, the trim at the top of the wall and at the floor, and around all doors and windows first. All brush work gets completed first when you start painting. Next, move in up and down motion with a roller, coating evenly from left to right across the entire wall when you are using the roller. Paint should be thicker with your brush than your first coat of the roller, so you may have to put on a second coat. Follow these rules and you should have a top-notch paint job the very first try!

(Image Via: The Painter Decorator)