I’ve been seeing this project in my head for a while and I finally got around to doing it. I painted one wall in my mudroom with stripes. Pretty painless but it makes a big difference in this room. I was putting it off for so long because my contractor had some more work to do first. We had exposed pipes that needed to be covered with soffits before I could do any measuring, painting and finishing. That work was finally done and I get to complete my mudroom.
I started off by priming over my original paint color and then painting it with two layers of Benjamin Moore Marscapone. It is easier to add a darker color over a lighter one. I was going to be using Benjamin Moore Beacon Gray for the contrasting stripe, which is the color of the rest of the mudroom.
Once that was done I measured my wall. I wanted an odd number of stripes so that the top stripe would be white and the bottom stripe would be white. I felt if I did it any differently the wall wouldn’t look right. I decided on 5 stripes because I wanted big bold stripes. I also wanted the area around my light switch and outlet to be white and 7 stripes would have thrown that all off.
I measured the wall from molding to molding and then divided that by 5 making each stripe 15.5 inches high. I made a small mark for each stripe with a pencil. Using a long ruler and a level I drew each individual stripe all the way across the wall. I then penciled in the blue stripe with a “b” so I was sure what color was going where! I followed a lot of the same steps as I did when painting my floors with stripes. You can see more of that here.
Then it was time to place the painters tape. I taped off where I would be painting the Beacon Gray, just two stripes of it. I then pressed the tape down and got my paint ready.
Last time I was very successful in getting clean and perfect stripes by painting my background color over the edge of the tape to seal in the color. The Beacon Gray went on immediately after. Two quick layers and I pulled off my tape and my striped wall was done.
Once I was done I put all my hooks and numbers back up for each of my kids. I’m still trying to decide what to add to the wall now. I’m debating between functional storage or pretty display. It might be a mix of both. Stay tuned for that.
Before (exposed pipes and all)….
and after….
It is a quick job for any room, perfect for a mudroom like this. I think it would also look great on a accent wall in a laundry room, pantry, foyer or bathroom. Practically anywhere come to think of it. If one of your rooms just needs a little change this is an easy project and can give a space a whole new feel.
