Paint Stripes on an Interior Wall

This technique is ideal for using contrasting colors on an accent wall. It looks great for a nursery, dining room, etc. The difficulty of this project is characterized as medium. The painting of the stripes is no more difficult than painting an entire wall. However, the taping is more difficult.

Steps

  1. Determine the width of the stripes. This is probably mostly personal preference, but perhaps the scale of the room should be a factor. In this article, 10" is chosen as a uniform stripe width.
  2. Paint the entire wall with the base color. If you intend to Sponge Paint a Ceiling, paint it first.
  3. Once the paint is dry, begin measuring from the least conspicuous corner in the room. It is unlikely that your last stripe will measure exactly 10" (or whatever size you use), so make sure that strip ends up in the least noticeable corner of the room. If you are only striping one accent wall, measure the wall and center the stripes (the outside of each end stripe should be equidistant from its corresponding corner).
  4. Using a level, measure and tape the stripes. For the purposes of this article, 2" tape was used (you'll find out why in a minute). Remember to tape the outside of the contrasting stripe. This means that if you went with 10" stripes and 2" tape, the exposed wall will alternate between 10" for the semi-gloss stripe, and 6" for the flat stripe. This is the step most likely to cause problems, so it is recommended that you eyeball the stripes one more time after you've finished taping. It helps to put small pieces of tape inside of the stripes that should not be painted, to serve as a visual reminder.
  5. Tape off the top and bottom of wall(s).
  6. Optional: To prevent paint bleeding (where the tape hasn't adhered 100% to the wall texture), use a small brush or trim roller to paint one coat of your base wall color over the tape seam. Once this paint is dry, proceed to next step. (This is so the base wall color will fill in any minor gaps in your tape seam. When you remove the tape in the final step you will have a nice, clean seam with zero bleed through.)
  7. Paint the contrasting stripes. You may need two coats. Remember that it was recommended to use 2" tape along the sides of the stripes? Here's why - with a 10" stripe, you can use a 12" roller and get full coverage on the stripe. The 2" tape gives you 14" to work with. The benefit of this is that there is no risk of roller lines. On the other hand, a standard 9" roller will be 1" short.
  8. Remove the tape shortly (around 5 minutes) after painting. If you are working with a partner, just get a 2-3 stripe head start and have your partner remove the tape right behind you.



Tips

  • After you have run your tape, pat it down first, then rub it down. This technique will help avoid pushing bends in your straight tape lines
  • Painters tape does not stick very strong so it helps to press over the edge of the tape just before painting, to get it tight and reduce the bleeding.

Things You'll Need

  • A level (preferably 24" or longer)
  • A pencil
  • 2" Wide painter's tape
  • A roller that is slightly wider than the stripes

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