Exterior Paint

Here are some interesting exterior projects. This is a good example of personal taste, as much as it is about the mechanics of getting a job done. The location of a property often sways the home owners choice of  color and aesthetics. For example in the first photo there is a house in Normandy Isles very near the Miami Beach area where deep Yellows, Golds, Crimsons and Greens are dominant in the area. This young lady was dead set on what I refer to as school bus yellow. I tried to gently, dissuade her for admittedly, selfish reasons. Yellow can be difficult to work with. Even though I used top quality, top of the line paint (in this instance Sherwin Williams Super Paint) after four coats of paint I could still see through it, when looking at it up close. This was a fun project over all because, I enjoy breathing new life into historic-type homes.

Speaking of which the Keys house belonged to and was enjoyed by our family, for two generations. It hadn’t been utilized since the last of the kids grew up and stopped using it for weekend partying. Apparently, it was commandeered by crack addicts and was facing condemnation and razing. Although we had family in the Keys who are contractors, when they drove by to see if it could be sold,they didn’t want to work on it. I drove down from Pembroke Pines, to see it for myself. That started a good six weeks of hard ass work with a 2-1/2 hour commute every day. The good news is, after replacing just about everything except the walls (all cement,even interior) and the ceiling (tongue and groove Dade pine) we did turn a profit within a few months. These houses are called conch houses. Many were built during the prohibition by Rum Runners from the Bahamas to stash booze in and are also known as Rum Houses, as we believe, was the case with this one.

The next three photos are of  a home in Boca Raton, where I painted everything from the roof itself, down to the drive way and patio. The idea with the driveway was to faux finish it to mimic the brick accent of the facade. I sprayed multiple coats of Xylene based stain of  brick red and charcoal grey, back and forth until I achieved the right mix of color. It’s a process I call “smoking the paint”. I don’t know the technical name, or what any one else calls it, nor do I care.

In the last photos is a home in Weston Hills Country Club. My customers here got semi-screwed over by the previous painters because, they used sub standard paint and preparation. It’s not uncommon to see new concrete stucco facades being painted with no primer, almost as fast as it takes for the stucco to dry. That’s a big mistake. If you can not wait the full sixty days for the stucco to cure then, it’s important to use Crete-Seal or a similar product as a primer. If you simply paint over uncured, unsealed cement it will cast a green-grey tone in about six months to a year. We settled on Benjamin Moore’s, Moore Guard in satin finish. Cafe Royal is the main body and the trim is also Cafe Royal at 25%.

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