Why Priming Is Important

Thank you everyone for  your kind words about my black interior doors! I know they are not for everyone, or every house, but I really love them in mine. They make our house feel a tiny bit less basic.

I asked my kids what they thought about the black doors and they all thought I should paint the trim around it black as well. Ummmm – okay, crazies!! However I DID just freshen up the trim and wanted to talk to you about it.

If you’ve been around here for a while you know that every nook and cranny of our house was either an orange natural wood or painted a shade of peach, orange, or dusty rose.

The kitchen doors and trim that were peach became white, but between the dog, kids and a lot of life being lived in this room, it was quickly apparent that the previous owner’s painter had not primed the varnished wood before the coat of peach. The white paint, along with the peach underneath, scratched right off.

I don’t prime everything I paint, but there are certain items that really need a coat of primer. If you’re going to do the job, you might as well do it right, right???? While I am not a professional, one thing I have a lot of experience with is house painting. I have learned a few lessons over the four houses we have owned and this is one of them:

 If you are painting raw or varnished wood, prime before painting!!!

Primer has better bonding capabilities than paint, so it is less likely to chip or scrape off. It will adhere better to the surface than paint alone.

A word on oil vs. water based primers:
I painted all the varnished and painted trim in my house with oil based Kilz or BIN 1-2-3….

but I recently started using the water based (latex) Kilz.  I switched to water based, despite the fact that the oil based is undoubtedly more durable, because the fumes of the oil based primer are REALLY bad and while I want to make my paintjob last, I also want MYSELF to last! I could just wear my  respirator when using the oil based primer, but then I wonder how long that foul odor lives in the house, with my family breathing it in. (Also, I abhor cleaning oil based paint from brushes, so there is the laziness thing too.)

As far as durability, I still think using a water based primer is a huge improvement over not using any primer at all on raw or varnished wood.

I have also tried many different paints over the years but always come back to Ben Moore, because in my opinion their paints have the best coverage. My local hardware store only carries the BM Regal line so I end up using that frequently, but I do like the “ben” line of their paints, which are low-VOC and a little bit less expensive than the Aura or Regal lines.

After scraping, sanding, and priming, all the trim in the kitchen got a fresh coat of paint. There is nothing like a fresh coat of paint to make this girl happy!!!!

It’s the small things, my friends.

More kitchen dreaming tomorrow! See you then.
xo,