How To Paint The Perfect Stripe

5 Materials
$50
2 Hours
Easy

Hey guys! Who here has ever tried to paint a perfect stripe on a wall or any other project only to discover your paint bled under your tape and it’s not perfect at all. I certainly have! I’d never attempted a striped wall before but had done stripes on some picture frames. I’d like to share the best TIP ever because the results are AMAZING, even on a very textured ceiling! Why, is it that my first-time painting stripes had to be on a ceiling?! I guess I like to make things hard for myself…and my Mom, Ha Ha.

First things first if you’re a major perfectionist like I am you’ll want to figure out the exact dimensions you have to work with in your space so that your stripes are nice and even!

After we had gone around the room and marked each stripe space, how in the world were we going to lay the tape on the ceiling in a straight line? Gah! Why did I want to stripe a ceiling again? My Mom had quite the clever idea! We would use a chalk line to help us mark the ceiling! Voila perfect lines! Here you can see the lines made by using the chalk line. This was very helpful when we were applying the green frog tape!

To use a chalk line, you really need at least 2 people. One of us would hold the end of the chalk line at the pencil mark on one end of the ceiling, and the other would unroll the chalk line across the room and hold it snug on the other side of the ceiling on the pencil mark. Once the chalk line was in position one person on either side gently pulled down on the chalk line so there is a little tension, and then let go to release it, then it will snap back up to the ceiling and makes a mark. A beautiful red mark across the whole ceiling. This made it so much easier to know exactly where the tape was going to be positioned!

Before you begin to tape off the stripes take note of where the stripes will be painted. You'll want to apply the tape along the chalk line on the outside edge of the stripe to be painted. Essentially when the whole space has been taped off, the stripe to be painted will be a little wider than the stripe on both sides of it.

Now, I know this picture isn’t the greatest, the lighting is blah and it’s a bit blurry…but I’m glad I thought to take any pictures at all while we were busy painting! Take a look at the green frog tape. See how the tape isn’t crisp? This is the CRITICAL step to getting that PERFECT stripe! After we applied the tape across the entire ceiling we pressed down as hard as we could with our fingernails, or you could use the edge of a credit card or something else that will push down on the tape firmly. Once we finished pressing the tape down on the entire ceiling, we then took the same white paint as the ceiling and painted a small edge along the green tape.

Start with your brush on the green tape and brush inward. Why do you paint a white stripe first? Bleeding will happen, especially on a very textured surface like a ceiling. This step allows any of the paint that will end up bleeding under the tape to be the same color as the original ceiling color. (A-hah!) It’s not necessary to paint the entire area sectioned off to be a stripe white, only the edge of the tape where it will bleed. Once the paint has dried you can go ahead and start painting the stripe in the color of your choice.

Start with a paint brush and cut in where the ceiling and wall meet. We did this in each stripe that was to be painted green. Then you can start rolling away. This part was a little scary just for the fact that you need to be slow and steady along the tape edge so you stay in the designated striped area. It really wasn’t too bad, you just had to take your time.

We removed the frog tape from the ceiling right after we were finished painting the green stripes. From other projects we’ve worked on in the past we’ve learned that it’s best to remove painters’ tape while the paint is still wet. I LOVE the finished result! Super crisp, neat and tidy, perfect stripes!

To see more pictures please visit the original post on our site.


How To Paint The Perfect Stripe

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