A Grand Fauxwell - Adventures in Updating

When we moved into our house last year, we knew that it was the perfect space for us, while still leaving lots of potential for future, er, customization. Especially when it came to the previous owner's affinity for faux finishes (our room, the kids' rooms, and even some countertops were fauxed out to the max).

Before...

I knew that the first finish I wanted to wave fauxwell to was that of the master bedroom; I had a vision of a nice warm gray from the moment the house was ours. The ball really started rolling in November when we got the bedding I'd long desired for our anniversary. I then made some trips to gather paint swatches, and consulted my fabulous should-be-interior-designer neighbor and friend. She helped me learn the art of undertones--deciding which neutrals blended with each other, whether a shade would read red or purple or green, and if a color could help pull together my victorian-shabby-chic collection of patterns or cause them to compete. Armed with her wisdom and her Sherwin-Williams paint deck, I then visited paint stores and grabbed more swatches, finally narrowing it down to four samples:

• Sherwin Williams Worldly Gray [too light and it read a little green]
• Behr Toasty Gray [too light and read slightly blue next to a few items]
• Behr Rustic Taupe [a little dark and read purple/red in some lights]
• Behr Perfect Taupe [and the fourth one was jusssst right!]

Home Depot easily convinced me to buy paintable contact paper that I could put directly on the wall, and immediately the Perfect Taupe jumped out at me as, well...perfect (and it kinda does look perfect in every image I've seen). My interior design consultant lent her critical eye and also confirmed that Perfect Taupe was the perfect unifer for the space.

(Seen bottom left and bottom right, respectively).

It highlighted the champagne and silver tones in our bedding, brought out the beauty of our master bedroom set without making the wood look so orange (like that darn orange wall did), and it blended nicely with the carpet. And so, with just a few days to go before Christmas, I dubbed that perfect little square on the wall the winner and dreamed of the day I wouldn't have to squint to block out any of the orangy-brown awfulness surrounding it. The only question remaining was when. And who. I wasn't convinced I could do it alone, or that it would actually happen anytime soon, knowing how long I can take to both start and finish a project.

My incredibe family, however (as I mentioned previously), thought differently - they decided the perfect time would be during their hard-earned vacation...and the perfect paint crew would be us. From the moment I opened my Christmas gift from my parents loaded with gift cards and paint supplies, I was a believer in their combined experience and confidence. [Not to mention unheard-of generosity. Just in case that part didn't come across enough earlier]. So we set out the day after Christmas with paint cards, gift cards, and plenty of excitement on my part.

Bro and Sis are not impressed.
Faux real. It had to go.

The Steps

TSP Wash

We washed the walls with TSP, an extremely strong detergent/solvent, to help dissolve the high-gloss finish the previous owners used over the faux finish. This involved soaking towels in the TSP solution and wiping down every inch of the wall (while wearing gloves!!), then thoroughly rinsing every inch of the walls again with clean water and letting it dry. Thankfully there wasn't any texture to the faux paint (beyond the original texture of the wall), so we were spared the pain of sanding, too!

Primer

After the walls dried, we used a white Zinsser Stain Blocking Primer to go over the extremely dark walls. We were worried about covering both the chocolate brown accent walls and the variation in colors on the faux-painted walls, so we opted for the stain blocking version. Ironically, right before we applied the primer, someone read the fine print on the can which said, "DO NOT USE WITH TSP." A frantic bout of Googling ensued, but the most we could find from paint forums and the company was that if the walls weren't rinsed adequately, the primer might not adhere as well. We took a gamble that we had rinsed everything well enough, and thankfully had no issues at all with the primer adhering. 

        

Indoctrinating the next generation of DIY designers. (Don't try this at home, folks!)

Paint

We went with Behr's Premium Ultra paint in an eggshell finish, which had great reviews (we briefly considered the Marquee Paint and Primer but when I started researching, the reviews for that one were not so positive). After priming with the bright white, the rest of the trim/ceiling paint in the room looked pretty dingy, and the Perfect Taupe was looking extremely tan and dark going on. It had me doubting for a bit...

But as soon as we started rolling and got the first coat, covering that stark blue-white primer, the optical illusion disappeared. The taupe dried a little lighter, and the gray undertones came back to life. The second coat sealed the deal, and the next day the natural morning light revealed exactly what I'd been imagining all these months--a perfect warm gray that immediately pulled everything together and made the room feel like the retreat I knew it was under all that faux craziness.

The Result!

A huge resounding never-ending thank-you goes to my family for this priceless gift! Special mention also goes to Auntie Chica for the childcare she provided while the rest of us were painting. Also the 15+ loads of laundry she did for us. (Come back, Sis?). The room is so much lighter, brighter, and it really does look and feel bigger. Since the room is longer than it is wide, so before we painted, the darker accent walls on either end made it feel even longer and more tunnelish than it really is. Thank goodness that's rectified now, in addition to the color. Every morning waking up in our new retreat has been a breath of fresh air (especially after the paint smell faded!) and I'm still beyond thrilled with the results.

Ahhh. That's better. 

I got new lamps for the nightstands and cleared a few surfaces, but aside from these very small changes, nothing has changed and the paint makes ALL the difference! There's still some work I want to do on the decor - like hang the mirrors that I bought to go above our night stands, hunt for the perfect window treatments to go with the updated blinds that we (the Victorian we, i.e. my dad) installed, and work on a focal piece (or pieces) for above the bed. I also need to hang some wedding prints! But now that the perfect (taupe!) canvas is in place and 90% of the work is done, I feel free to really let the inspiration carry me. 

And make no mistake, with my newfound confidence and experience, that inspiration is going to carry me right through the door to tackle the bathroom next with a little muted blue:

Salmon and chocolate walls, your days are numbered!

Stay tuned!