Painting and decorating FAQ's

The best paint for woodwork is Colourtrend. See our blog on “The best interior paint and woodwork”.

The best paint for walls is Colourtrend and Colourtrend Ceramic Paints. See our blog on “The best interior paint and woodwork”.

No, you do not need to be at home, most people are working and give us a key, we ensure when we leave each evening that the house is locked up securely.

This depends on the size of the job and how many men are working on it.

Yes, many of our clients when getting extensive work done go away and leave us in charge of looking after their home, for complete decoration, and they come back to a new home. Contact us for references.

We can move all your furniture, take down pictures and curtains, and put it all back up when we are finished. However this is time-consuming, so we generally suggest that you move all small items and as much other stuff as possible, this way it takes us less time to do the job.

Yes, we generally sand and fill all the walls and woodwork where needed. When we write our quotation we state exactly what you will get for the money you are spending.

There will always be dust created when preparing for painting. The extent of repairs on walls and ceilings generally determine how much dust is created. However, we painstakingly cover all furniture and flooring and vacuum up meticulously each and every day using our own vacuum cleaner.

I am on-site as much as possible supervising all work, and doing as much as possible to expedite the job.

All Impressions Painting and Decorating personnel are professional painter decorators. They are all vetted before working, and generally have been with the company for years and are completely trustworthy.

Most emulsion paints are low odour. You can choose oil paint for your woodwork, this has a strong odour but is far less than it used to be as they are being phased out in favour of water-based paints which are very low odour and faster drying.

Yes, you can change the handles on your kitchen when you are getting it hand-painted. See our “Kitchen Transformation” blog for an example.

Yes, we can use organic paints, but like water-based paints, it took a while for the quality to come up to standard. The technology used to produce organic paints is improving all the time so they will become more commonplace.

Yes, we offer a full-colour consultancy.

Yes, indeed we will put up samples for you, or give you advice on where the best places are in a room to give you the right idea of how the colour will look in your room.

Yes, we have an expert wallpaper hanger who only hangs wallpaper.

Yes, it is possible to paint over wallpaper depending on how good the wallpaper is fixed on the wall.

Yes, you can have as many colours as you like. We also paint and wallpaper feature walls. Each colour will cost the price of the paint, it does take longer to do different colours so you will be charged time and materials.

You can change your mind whenever you like. We will help you with samples beforehand, so hopefully you will have a good idea of what it will be like to avoid such a scenario. If we do have to change it will be charged at time and materials.

Yes, you can mix more expensive colours into generic brand bases to achieve more or less the same effect.

All quotations and consultations are free of charge.

Generally, we quote for two coats of paint on all surfaces, unless otherwise stated.

There many types of floor paint, both water-based and oil-based, for industrial use and domestic. See our blog on “What is the best floor paint and how do I paint my wooden floor” for more information.

Yes, you can paint tiles with special tile paint and primers.

Yes, with the proper primers and preparation we can do a beautiful new paint job on your laminate kitchen. You can see examples of this type of work in our blog on painting laminated kitchen units and wardrobes.

No, you do not have to use special paints, but there are recommended paints for kitchen and bathrooms such as “soft sheen” paints which handle moisture better and are wipeable.

Yes, we paint all sorts of kitchen and bathroom furniture/cabinets, etc. for expert cabinetmakers. Here you can see examples of our hand-painted kitchen work and our hand-painted bathroom cabinets.

Yes, it is quite possible to paint stone or marble given the right preparation. You can read our blog about “How to prepare marble” where we painted the marble surround of an Aga.

We use two very skilled handymen for our handy work, some of which we can sometimes do ourselves free of charge, depending on what it is.

Generally, we insist on buying the paint as this ensures a high-quality paint that is suited for the job and that will include the required amounts of coats.

Some colours when very dark are categorised as “low hide” colours. This means they have more pigment than base colours, so it takes many more coats to get a definition of colour. As a result, this takes longer so will cost more.

Yes, if you give us the reference we can match most RAL colours quite accurately.

With oil-based paints, you should try to leave doors and windows open for as long as possible – 8 hours perhaps. We also suggest that you open them periodically over the following days to ensure they do not stick. For water-based paints, a couple of hours is generally ok, but again opening them regularly afterwards for a few days to ensure that they do not stick. This is because water-based paints may dry more quickly but take a long time to cure and harden.

There can be several reasons for this and yes we can help with all of them. From lime-based plaster, which will need a breathable paint, to walls that need to be stabilised with a primer before painting.

Yes. This is mostly caused by water damage. We can use a stain block before painting and your stains will be gone for good. And if they are not gone it means you still have a leak.

The cause of this is that whoever painted the wood first did not use a knotting solution on the knots in the wood. We wrote a blog explaining why knotting wood before painting is important. A knotting solution prevents stains in the wood from happening. We use a shellac-based primer before re-painting which will sort out the problem of the stains in your woodwork.

We’ve been in business since 1991 – that’s over 30 years of experience!

Yes, we have many examples of finished work, both interior and exterior painting and decorating all over Dublin and beyond. You can see examples of all of our work on our Painting and Decorating Gallery.

Yes, you can contact us for references or read some of our painting and decorating testimonials on the website.

The VAT on painting and decorating as a service is 13.5%.

Yes, all Impressions Painting and Decorating workmen are fully insured. We have both EL and PL insurance.