Tips for Painting Your Shutters and Trim
How to Properly Paint Shutters and Trim
Your shutters and trim might only make up a small fraction of your home exterior’s surface area, but their appearance has a major impact on your home’s curb appeal as a whole. Our eyes are naturally drawn to these protruding components, so if they’re neglected or poorly painted, it’s hard to miss. So, when it’s time to give your house exterior a fresh coat, you can’t rush through your trim and shutters. Of course, painting these features properly requires additional effort, patience, and care -- and the results are worth it. With that in mind, here are our top tips for painting your shutters and trim.
Choose Contrasting Colors
Before you even purchase your paint, you must consider what you want your shutters and trim to look like. Most professional exterior house painters will recommend going with colors that contrast the rest of your home’s exterior. If your siding boasts a lighter shade, for instance, applying darker trim and shutters can make your property more appealing and dynamic. The same goes for vice versa (lighter trim works well against darker siding). Ultimately, the choice is yours, of course, but take the time to choose the best color(s) for your needs.
Remove Your Shutters Prior to Painting
While your home’s trim must remain affixed to its surface, your shutters can (and should) come off before you paint them. Doing so won’t just make the shutter painting process easier -- it will also allow you to more easily paint the surrounding areas of your exterior without making a major mess. Once your shutters have been removed from your home’s exterior, prop them up on sawhorses (if you have them), clean the surfaces, scrape away old paint, and sand them. Then, you can paint them thoroughly on all sides using a spray, brush, and/or roller.
Perform the Necessary Surface Preparations for Exterior Home Painting
When it comes to painting any surface, proper surface preparation is key to achieving the best results. Your trim and shutters, along with the rest of your home’s exterior, should be thoroughly washed. A pressure washer can get the job done quickly and effectively, but make sure you know how to use it properly, or else you risk damaging your surfaces and/or injuring yourself and those around you. It’s a good idea to wash your shutters separately from the rest of your home so you hit all sides of them and reach the areas of your home behind them.
After the dirt and debris have been cleared away from your trim and shutters, check them for damage and make necessary repairs (i.e. replace caulking between the trim and other surfaces, reinforce any nails or screws, etc.). Also, any old, loose paint should be scraped away, and your trim and shutters should be sanded down to create a more paint-receptive surface.
Stock up on Painter’s Tape, Tarp, Plastic, and Cloths
Surface prep isn’t the only kind of prep work involved here. You also want to ensure that paint doesn’t land on surfaces that it shouldn’t, such as shrubbery and glass window panes. Fortunately, this is less of a concern when painting your shutters, considering they won’t be attached to your home during the process. Just make sure you place drop cloths underneath your sawhorses propping up your shutters when painting them. As for painting your trim, tape off and/or cover any areas you don’t want exposed to the paint in question, such as windows, nearby siding, any surfaces underneath the painting area, etc.
Use Small Angled Brushes for Precision Painting
Both trim and shutters contain several small, thin areas that can be challenging to coat properly and completely. Spraying your shutters is a good method for achieving full coverage, but this type of application isn’t always an option, especially for painting trim. So, to reach those tight spaces and cover every inch of your shutters and trim, have some small, angled, quality brushes at the ready.
Re-attach Your Shutters the Right Way
When all is said and done, the final step of painting your shutters is re-attaching them to your home. It’s vital that you perform this final task properly. For one thing, the new paint on your shutters as well as your trim and siding must be fully dry. Then, of course, you must have the proper hardware and tools to reinstall them. If you’re not sure how to go about these steps, most professional home painting services will include this task in their packages.
There is more to painting shutters and trim than meets the eye. For more tips on these processes, reach out to Nash Painting. And to learn more about us, our services, and our values, call us at 615-829-6858 today!