Almost everyone has painted at least a room in Iris home-and fin-

ished the job a bit dissatisfied, convinced there must be ways to

make the work go faster and easier while simultaneously producing

a better result. There are such ways. Every trade has its tricks, and

painting is no exception. If you know them, you will be able to save

yourself time and effort and do the job right, t

A painter s craft is not merely a matter of procedures and tech-

niques. It begins with an understanding of what point is and how it

works. The coating that you put on your house ceates a tough film

that 1) bonds itself to either a fresh, new surface or an old, uneven

one; 2) covers and helps to protect that surface against the assaults

of weather, airborne chemicals and dirt; and 3) remains flexible

enough to stay intact for years while the walls settle, vibrate, and ex-

pand and contract with changes in temperature. The coating that ac-

complishes all of this is only about five thousandths of an inch thick

-just a little thicker than a page of this book.

Almost any liquid that dries into such a coat for a surface can be

considered a paint and an astonishing variety of materials have gone

into these mixtures. In India, boiled rice was used to bind paint to

gether; milk and lime have been principal ingredients in popular

coatings; and there are some modern paints that consist essentially

of colored cement or dissolved rubber. But/most Of the paints in

common use contain certain types of ingredients, each with a spe-

cific function. Substances called pigments, made from minute

particles of earth, metals or chemical compounds, give paint its col-

or (varnishes, being colorless, are unpigmented paint). The ability to

form a thin, tough film comes Irom ingredients called resins, often

known as binders. These resins were originally the natural secretions

of certain plants and insects, but now consist mostly of rnan-made

chemicals plastics-such as alkyds, acrylics, polyvinyls or urethanes.

Chemical agents called plasticizers keep the paint elastic after it

dries. And to make the mixture of pigment, resin and plasticizer thin

enough to be used with a brush or roller, it is combined with a sol-

vent that may be water, a mineral spirit such as benzine or a plant de-

rivative such as turpentine.

No one paint is right for every surface-and no paint of any kind

will work well if you use the wrong tools to prepare the surface or

apply the paint. The chart on pages 8 and 9 matches both interior

and exterior paints to almost any surface that you are likely to en

counter; on pages 18-19 and 54-55 you will find pictures and

descriptions of all the tools you will need for any painting job. The

remainder of this chapter deals with the specific problems and the

techniques of interior painting.