Painting Popcorn Ceilings

May 3, 2017

Richard Moore

One of my goals in retirement was to repaint all the ceilings in our house. After 25 years they had become a bit dingy. My first thought was to scrape the popcorn ceilings to give the nice flat ceiling that is the trend now. Doing some investigation it seemed that the scraping part was not all that hard, but it was the mudding and sanding that was a deal breaker. Instead, I decided to simply repaint the popcorn ceilings and it seems after doing eight rooms I am getting pretty good at it.

Like any painting effort, using quality paint and equipment leads to good results. I have settled on using a ½ inch nap roller, I like the rollers from Home Depot that come in a 3 pack for $8.99. Each roller lasts for painting the ceiling in one room. I found that that a higher nap roller was a bit unwieldy. I am a big fan of the Behr paint products from Home Depot, both ceiling and wall. It is a bit more costly but given the time and effort one is putting into painting putting a few more dollars into paint for good results makes sense. For ceiling paint I buy their Premium Plus Interior Ceiling Flat paint in a two gallon bucket. Old popcorn ceilings seem to really suck up the paint and a gallon never seems to last.

Buy a sturdy roller, the cheap ones have too much flex in them for painting ceilings, trust me I learned the hard way. Spend more money and you will be happy. Lastly, get an extension pole for the roller. I use a 4 foot one usually, but did have to resort to a 9 foot one for the vaulted ceiling in our bedroom. The extension pole will keep you from having to go up and down a ladder, which is very tiring. It also speeds up the painting process.

The next step in the process is prepping the room. Remove as much furniture as you can. Move the rest to the sides of the room. I use 3 mil clear Poly Plastic sheeting that I got from Menards in 10’ x 25’ sheets for under $8. I ended up using 3 of them for larger rooms (cut for easier handling). Using 3M blue tape I tape the sheets to the walls about a foot below the ceiling. I had the benefit of knowing I was going to be painting the walls after I did the ceiling, which is the best way to do things. The use of the plastic will keep the drips from applying the paint thickly on the ceiling from getting on the walls, furniture, molding, windows, and flooring. Here are some pictures of the process of putting plastic up.

In this room I took down the ceiling fan since I knew I was replacing it. Otherwise I tape and protect any fixtures. Once the plastic is up I then vacuum the ceiling using my 1 gallon Stanley Shop Vac with a smaller utility nozzle on it. Lightly vacuum the ceiling, which will also knock some of the popcorn down making the painting process easier.

I vacuum up the popcorn that was knocked down and then put heavy duty canvas drop clothes down. Mine are 12’ by 15’ ones that cost about $30 at Menards. I have found these to be very useful in painting rooms. Once this is done, you are ready to start painting.

When painting I put a fairly heavy load on the roller and then roll quickly in a single direction with a pass out and back. Do not, I repeat do not try to do any more passes in a single area. And only do a single direction. If you try to do more passes the old ceiling paint and popcorn will start to peel off making a mess, trust me.

If you have areas that do not get paint like below, do not try to touch it up. Wait for you second coat. Yes it will take two coats. If you get any marks on the walls use a paintbrush to smooth the paint.

Once the first coat is done put the tray, roller, and brush together in a kitchen trash bag and twist tie it shut. This will keep the paint from drying and eliminate the need to wash things out between coats. You are now done for the day. I know it says 4 hours to recoat on the paint container, but I have found that with the heavy layer of paint put on in the first coat you really need to let the ceiling sit for a night to dry. Otherwise the popcorn can peel off.

For the second coat put the paint on in the opposite direction you put the first coat on. For our vaulted bedroom ceiling I had to go the same direction but tried to make sure I overlapped the passes from the first coat. The same concept is true on the second coat as on the first, only apply the point with an out and back stroke and leave it. This time you can wait 4 hours and lightly touch up any areas with roller that need it, just do not use a heavy load of paint on the roller and roll lightly. I then trim out the edges with a brush, and the follow up 4 hours later with another trimming of the edges with the brush.

At this time you should have a nicely painted ceiling and can start on the walls.

Here is the final result with new ceiling fan and walls painted.

Happy painting!

keywords: Painting,Ceiling Painting,Popcorn Ceilings,Remodeling

description: My experience in repainting popcorn ceilings