When it comes to painting your walls, the decision is not just about color. With an array of specialty paints available (and constantly growing), finishes and functions are other matters to consider. Apartment Therapy is doing our best to cover many of the specialty options out there...
1: Metallic Paint Find a selectino of five glazes from Benjamin Moore and a metallic version from Ralph Lauren, too. And gain a little inspiration, pictured up top in this house by Marcel Prins
2: Aura by Benjamin Moore When Aura paint was in the test lab a year ago, it was strongly recommended.
3: Old Fashioned Milk Paint Sold in powder form, it's a green option that's made of just milk protein, lime (which becomes inert when mixed with the acidic milk), clay, and earth pigments.
4: Magic Wall Magnetic Paint This paint makes your wall attract magnets, as seen above used with rare earth magnets.
5: Chalkboard Paint Tilano is one brand (expensive) or, make your own. Pair it with magnetic paint for a stickable and writable surface.
A Home Tech specialty: Wifi Network Protection Paint allows you to secure your network with aluminum-iron-oxide-embedded paint on the walls of your home.
© 2009 Apartment Therapy
What about full spectrum paints?
view mschatelaine's profile
ooh, where is that first picture from? More pics please!
view Lesley's profile
OOOOOOOOOhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh Metallic Paint!!!!!!!!!!! Me likes.
view clampers's profile
How timely! We are in the midst of putting up a chalkboard frame and a dry erase frame on our kitchen wall. Both frames are old vintage guys we picked up along the way.
Uh...running into some technical difficulties at the moment since we have plaster walls and would ideally like the frames to be flush to the wall. So we're trying to figure some things out, but can't wait till we have them up.
http://www.donkeehouse.com
view bitdot's profile
could we perhaps get a bit more information on what makes these paints unique, and some pictures for inspiration? the metallic paints are helpful. the others, not so much.
view erinalter's profile
I've used #1 and #2 and love them both. We finished our ugly white vinyl french doors, with a shimmery gun metal. We even used a pearl metalic on our bathroom vanity. Super easy to use too.
view mintagehome's profile
Aura paint is amazing. It's pricey, but the coverage is so good, and the smell is almost non-existent.
view SFDC's profile
Another worth mentioning: Canvas Diamondhard Furniture, Cabinet & Trim Paint.
http://www.canvascorp.com/furniture-paint.aspx
I discovered this paint recently when redecorating my living room & dining room. It enables you to paint on almost any surface without sanding and priming. I used it on a pair of Ikea laminate bookshelves, and love the finished product. (Typically you'd have to sand the entire laminate surface several times, including at least once after priming it. What a headache, particularly if you live in an apartment and don't have an outdoor space in which to work!)
The paint has to be ordered directly from the manufacturer, but I found them easy to work with. One downside: It's only available in a handful of shades. My solution? I picked the shade closest to what I wanted, and used the Canvas Diamondhard to "prime" my bookshelves, then painted over the Canvas Diamondhard with the latex paint color of my choice.
I loved this product, and would wholeheartedly recommend it to people who want to paint over laminates, stained surfaces, varnishes, metals and plastics where paint normally wouldn't be able to easily grab the surface.
view chgoeditor's profile
If you're lucky enough to be in Tucson and looking for paint, you could stop by the Citron showroom: http://www.citronpaint.com/colormenu.html
It's full-spectrum paint, which if I understand the process correctly, means the hue is adjusted using other colors around the color wheel, instead of black.
The "What makes our paint yummy" page gives a pretty good description of how it's done:
http://www.citronpaint.com/yummy.html
The fan book is kindof pricey, but the samples are reasonable.
view DianneS's profile
I cannot stop looking at the first pic. Where did you get it from? I am about ready to go paint my whole house after looking at that pic.
view chicity1126's profile
Glad someone mentioned full-spectrum paints because they make all the difference between flat & boring & walls that look like they're alive, infused with the paint. Besides not using black pigment, they use all of the pigments in the color spectrum so they have more depth, are more luminous. I especially like Ellen Kennon's line because they are "green" (no VOCs--none) and her colors are stunning!
http://www.ellenkennon.com
Here's a great link to a page with "after" photos sent from customers:
http://www.ellenkennon.com/testimonials.htm
Her paints are priced around the same as the BM Aura line.
She doesn't have to ship her paints like Citron does.
view drekerator's profile