Painting & Decorating — frequently asked questions

No — we move and cover furniture as part of the job. If you can clear small items and ornaments beforehand it helps, but the heavy lifting and dust sheets are on us.

Yes — bring us a tin lid, a colour card, or even a flake of the old paint and we can have it matched. We use trade paints that cover properly and last.

A typical bedroom takes one to two days including preparation and two coats. We'll give you a realistic timescale with the quote — and we stick to it.

We recommend we supply: trade paints cover better and last longer than retail ranges, we get them at trade prices, and we know exactly how they behave. If you've already bought paint, we'll use it — but we'll tell you honestly if it needs a third coat that eats the saving.

With us: not at all. Floors get hard-wearing protection, furniture is moved to the middle and sheeted, and everything is vacuumed and returned at the end. Preparation dust is controlled with extraction on sanders. You'll find the room cleaner than we found it.

We recommend modern water-based systems for most homes: they dry fast, don't smell for days, and stay white instead of yellowing. Oil-based still has its place on high-wear surfaces — we'll recommend per room rather than dogma.

Emulsion is touch-dry in a couple of hours and rooms are usually usable the same evening — we plan the order of work so you're never sleeping in the hall. Full cure takes a week or two, so gentle on the washing until then.

Interior work runs year-round. Exterior work is weather-dependent — masonry paint needs dry surfaces and reasonable temperatures to cure — so we schedule exterior jobs honestly rather than gambling with your money on a forecast.

Never directly — painting over mould just feeds it. We treat and kill the mould first, identify why it's there (usually condensation or a leak), fix the cause where it's ours to fix, then finish with mould-resistant coatings. Otherwise it comes straight back.

Typical bedroom £280–£380 including paint.

1–2 days per room

From £140 for a standard room ceiling.

Half a day to a day

From £120 including paint.

Half a day

From £160 per feature wall, plus the paper.

Half a day per wall