The breakthrough

At last! But first, more masking, this time downwards from the bottom of the coving. I had to start by putting up more of the masking paper but this time the other way up and as previously, before I’d even finished some at the beginning had begun to come off again. But I had no choice except to press on even though it meant keep going back to check work I’d already done to ensure that it was still positioned on the walls where it was supposed to be.

After the masking paper to give me a straight line below the coving I then had to hang sheets of film down to the floor to protect the green walls from the white finishing coat that I was about to apply to the coving and ceiling. And lucky that I did as the following shots taken after I’d finished spray painting show, this time with absolutely no hitches or hiccups.

Like the surgeon said after the operation, the dressings come off tomorrow, but after I’d cleaned the spraying machine and the other bits and pieces that I’d used, I couldn’t wait to take some of the masking down from the walls to see how the colours work together and also some of the masking from the floor in the corridor which has been down for what seems like weeks.

My phone camera makes the green a bit greener than it really is but from what I could see this evening, I’m delighted with the results. I’ve always liked fresh green and white together and the white switches and sockets also accent the combination beautifully. So although it’s taken a very long time and been a very painful process, I’ve got what I was aiming for. The proof of the pudding will be when I go back tomorrow, remove the rest of the masking and take a closer look.

There is some making good of the green line below the coving to do caused by the ‘gentle’ blue masking tape tearing the plasticky edge of the paint off when it was removed. But that won’t take much to do and I’ll be more interested in seeing how the white finish has come out on the ceiling. I can’t wait to install all the lights in it tomorrow which have been hanging down for what seems like forever.

In all honesty, my living room and hall walls and ceiling actually represent a huge painting project, especially for a single person working alone, and I doubt that I’ll ever again take on anything else like it. Having a two-colour combination also made it considerably more complicated and time consuming, but if tomorrow the results do turn out to be OK I’ll have got what I wanted and it’ll all have been worth it 🙂