How to Color Block Paint a Room

It’s super easy to color block paint a room to add affordable style to a room. When you can’t afford wallpaper or want to keep a room pretty simple, but don’t want it to be a snoozefest, color blocking is a great technique to incorporate. Here’s to how to pull it off:

Steps to Color Block Paint:

1. Paint the base color of the wall (usually the lighter color is painted first). We tend to do primer and two coats of paint, so this first step takes a couple days for all of the coats to dry. Make sure it is completely dry before moving to the next step.

2. Use a laser level to mark where you want the line to be. It’s best to ask for someone to come look at the laser line as well to get a second opinion that it looks right.

3. Mark the outer side of the laser line with a piece of yellow frog tape, which is gentler than the blue tape and less likely to pull up the base paint. It works best for one person to hold down the starting point of the tape while the other unrolls the paint and lays out the line. Then the first person smooths down the tape, making sure it is flat without any bubbles in it.

4. Paint the second color to the edge of the tape. You can mix and match dark and light colors for however intense you want the contrast to be. We painted two coats and let it dry for 30 mins to an hour. You don’t want it be totally dry before you take the tape off because that could peel the paint off of the wall.

5. Pull the tape off and view your color block. The best part! Start at one end and remove the tape. It is soooooooo satisfying seeing the color block emerge!

6. Touch up the paint using a tiny paintbrush. There will be places where the pain bleeds, ruining your crisp lines, so fix the small mistakes with a thin paint brush. It really doesn’t take much time and it looks so good to fix those errors so your color block really shines.

We were inspired to incorporate color block paint into our home after watching Hotel Makeover where they added pops of color to bring cheap and easy style to their guest rooms. Check out these tips for prepping for a weekend of painting projects. Then, after you master color block paint, up your game with a graphic paint design!