Craig Phillips’ 8 tips on the best ways to refresh your home with a lick of paint
The former Big Brother winner and DIY expert shares his tried and tested ways to cheaply brighten up your home. By Lisa Salmon
One of the cheapest, easiest and eye-catching ways to improve the look of your home is through paint – and ‘Mr DIY’ Craig Phillips insists painting is not only transformative, it can be fun.
The winner of the first Big Brother series, who’s now a presenter on his own YouTube channel Mr and Mrs DIY, insists the days of magnolia walls and white skirting boards are long gone because there’s such a variety of paint colours and finishes available, and people want to show off their paint jobs on social media.
“It’s more fashionable now to want to do better things with painting,” he says. “About 10 or 20 years ago it was typically just magnolia walls and white skirting boards, and it wasn’t looked at as anything fun to do, it was just a chore. Now, paints have evolved, with styles and designs and certainly help from social media, and people enjoy painting now – they want to paint.
“They want to create an environment in their house that makes them feel good, and show it off on social media. It’s become competitive – people want to do a better job than their friends.”
What also helped change attitudes towards painting, says the 52-year-old home improvement expert, was staying at home so much during the pandemic, which made people want to brighten up their interiors.
“Painting helped people,” he explains. “They often felt quite depressed and down with what was going on in the world, and they were living in a dull environment, and they realised the amount of different colours and different types of paint they could use not just to paint walls, skirting boards or window frames, but also to paint furniture, garden furniture, decking, and fencing outside. And it really made people enjoy painting again.
“It really put them in a better mood, realising they can change the environment they live in. They can really spruce up what is their castle, their home, and make themselves feel good about it.”
Here are Phillips’ tips for painting your home…
1. Don’t be frightened of using bright colours
Phillips believes there’s no longer a need to opt for safe, neutral colours in your home, and says: “I think that was the mindset of people five or 10 years ago, and I admit it was me. I was one of the ones who was a little bit boring with ‘safe colours’ – but not now.
“I think people are brave nowadays, and they go with the big, bold colours. At the end of the day, it is only paint – if you go with a big and bold colour and it doesn’t quite work with your theme, you can always paint over it, you can tone it down a little bit.”
And that toning down, he says, can be done by mixing colour paints to develop your own unique shades.
Get a little tester paint, pop a bit on the wall and just see – surprise yourself!
Craig Phillips
“You can probably get a little tester paint, pop a bit on the wall and just see – surprise yourself! You really, really have got to think out of the box,” he stresses.
2. Try colour drenching
In the past, decorators would paint the ceiling, skirting boards and woodwork white, and possibly the walls a different colour, but Phillips points out that trend has changed.
“Now we’ve got different colours to match the wall colours, and it’s merging those walls,” he says. “People are doing the skirting and their wooden flooring with paint to try and keep that style going right the way through the room, and it works brilliantly, with people getting more brave and more colours available to do these type of designs.”
3. Blend in the radiators
Part of colour drenching is painting radiators the same colours as the walls, says Phillips, who presents a video showing how prepare a radiator by cleaning it with warm water and sugar soap to remove any stains, gently sanding it down, if necessary, and then applying a self-priming chalk and mineral paint with a soft satin finish, in the same colour as the wall. “You get a matte finish on the wall, and a satin sheen on the radiator, and it works a treat,” he promises.
“Do that with maybe a little shelf over the radiator, and the skirting in the same colour, and it just completely transforms that wall.”
4. Go for an accent wall
If you’re not brave enough to paint all the walls of a room in a bright colour, use a stand-out shade on one feature or accent wall. Phillips suggests.
“People are doing just one accent colour on the wall, so they’re keeping the other three walls a relatively tame colour, and then going in bigger and bolder with that one big colour on one wall, and carrying that through on the skirting boards, the radiators, the dado, the picture rails, etc,” he says.
5. Look at painting ideas on social media
Phillips says he gets painting ideas off social media, and by looking at the Frenchic Facebook fan forum. “I would certainly advise people wanting to paint their house to look at those platforms and at what everybody else is doing, and the information they’re sharing,” he says.
“Me and Laura, my wife, look at it quite regularly, and we’re blown away by what people are doing out there. It doesn’t always work for everybody’s house, but it is only paint and you can paint over it if it isn’t quite right.”
6. Create a mood board
Phillips says it’s a good idea to start out by creating a mood board, which can be physical or digital, and usually contains photos, colours, textures etc that represent what you like and how you want your room to look.
“They might start off with paint swatches which are the kind of colours and textures they want to go for, and then try and build off that with other additions that tie into the wall colour they’ve chosen,” he explains.
7. Blend in soft furnishings and rugs
Phillips advises home decorators to match the colour on their walls, woodwork and radiators with some soft furnishings, even if they’ve just painted one accent wall. “You might try and find rugs, cushions, or throws to go over the couches, in a similar colour so you’ve not just got that colour down one end of the room, “ he suggests.
“You may not be able to afford to replace your couch, but you can change the look of it by adding soft furnishings, tying the colours in with the paint.”
8. Paint second-hand furniture
Phillips says he’s a “big, big believer in second-hand furniture”, and observes: “Everybody’s feeling the pinch of the cost of living, and I’m a landlord myself, and we buy, if we need to, let’s say, second-hand bedroom unit or drawer sets. You can go to a charity shop and buy a really good, solid kind of sometimes retro-style furniture which could be 60 years old, but is in better nick, stronger, and made from better materials than some of the lightweight stuff that a lot of the big stores are selling nowadays.
“Go to the charity shops – you’re supporting a charity, it’s better for the environment, and it’s better for your pocket.”
Then, if your second-hand piece is a colour you don’t like, paint it to match your room, he suggests. “Start getting creative – it might be a dark teak wood, which was in 60 or 70 years ago, but doesn’t fit with the style now. With just a small amount of preparation and painting, all of a sudden you can bring it back to life.”
Craig Phillips is an ambassador for the chalk and mineral Frenchic Paint.
