Exterior Painting

So blame us; we were not too hot about the fobby-blue trim that highlighted our downspouts and eaves. So even though a few people (who shall remain unnamed) thought we were crazy to blow money throwing a fresh coat of paint over a fresh coat of paint, we went ahead and repainted the outside of our house.




Before we had our familial housewarming party, we thought we'd cover up all the blue parts with a shoddy, drippy, rather messy job of Ultra Pure White Behr paint from Home Depot. It didn't come out too bad, but because our house's main body was such a light tint of grey, the overall effect was a rather white-looking house. Plus, it took us 5 weekends to complete the job, and if you bothered to look, you'd see we did a sloppy job around corners and crevices with our rollers and brushes. Another lesson learned: when you're this inexperienced and cannot tolerate less than perfection, leave it to the pros.




So, time to choose some paint shades. Our painting contractors put up some shade samples for us to choose from and suggested we go with the better-quality Kelly Moore paint. The first two, Oyster and Graystone, are his recommendations. The third in line was our attempt to match a Behr shade called Cornerstone, our original choice for the body of the house. The Kelly Moore equivalent was Pale Pollen, but it came out more yellow than we expected on a large sample swatch, especially when viewed in the sunlight. The fourth sample is Swiss Coffee, what our contractor suggested in lieu of Ultra Pure White for the trim and details, which he explained could turn yellow over time. The Swiss Coffee makes this less evident as the paint wears because it's got a little yellow tint mixed in, but to the naked eye, especially when in contrast with a darker paint shade, it appears white. The things ya learn as a house owner.


Tung is all for darker shades, but he already got to pick the dark-gray roof color. I'm into the pale/pastel/bright-house look, so after a bit of debate and several viewings, we decided to go with Oyster (Sample #1) for the body of the house.







The painters did a good job overall--they were very prompt and quick. In three days, they had already pressure-washed, caulked, primed, prepped, and painted the house, with very few mistakes. We called them back for three touch-ups, including the garage door that was supposed to be in Swiss Coffee instead of Oyster. Here it is below, primed for its true shade.







Okay, I'd be lying if I said I didn't want that very awesome, super-quick, heavy-duty, professional paint gun that homeboy has. He turned what is probably a 3-weekend job for us into a 30-minute job, which includes the prep work. The actual spraying took about 3 minutes. It's like watching an airbrush artist at work, very cool.

Here are some Before's and After's for comparison. The top picture shows the old paint colors and our new, gray roof.

Here's a frontal shot of the house with the new colors (note, old roof alert in the top image).





And finally, a full shot of the complete job. Am I ever so glad I'm coming home to this every day now instead of what was there before! Loving the house more and more--fresh paint makes such a huge difference in terms of overall feel and newness.