Porch Painting Diamond Pattern 101

I was finally able to finish snapping and taping off my porch yesterday for the diamond pattern I am going to be painting. Between the weather and feeling sick from the spider bite it had held my progress up. The painting will now go very quick. I thought I would post a "tutorial" (if you will) for those that are interested in doing something similar to their floors; inside or out.

LEVEL: Intermediate

STEP 1: Clean your surface. Make sure you are working with the cleanest surface you can possibly have. Remove any loose paint by scraping, sweeping, scrubbing. Clean surface using cleaner such as TSP (this is the BEST for removing and grime and giving you the best surface to start with) power washing is also a good idea.

STEP 2: You will be using 2 colors for the diamond pattern so you want to roll your lighter base color down first over the entire surface area. I find it best if you first use a paintbrush to "cut in" or paint along the edges like walls and corners first before rolling so you do not have to bring the roller close to your walls.

STEP 3: After letting the base coat dry for at least 24 hours we are ready to start marking and snapping lines for the diamond (or checkerboard) pattern. Start at one corner of the room, using a speed square, mark a line at a 45 degree angle.

STEP 4: Using that 45 degree angle take your chalk line and bring it across the room at that 45 degree angle and snap your line. (you will need 2 people for this)

STEP 5: Measure the length of that line, in the middle at a 90 degree angle to your snapped line, snap another line, intersecting the first. These will be the lines that you measure and snap the rest of your lines off of.

STEP 6: Decide what size your squares will be (mine were 22") and using a square mark lines at 22" along your snapped lines, first vertically then horizontally or vise versa. As you move along and snap your lines you may want to check and make sure your squares are all 22" (in my case) many times you can be a hair off in the beginning and by the time you are in the middle you could be 1/2" off, so it's always best to check and compensate in the beginning if necessary.

Once you finish snapping lines, you can stand back and admire your pattern.

TAPING

I don't know WHY but I didn't take pictures of the taping progress. D'OH! Let's see if I can explain it anyway.

First you need to decide where you would like to start. I chose to start against the siding. Then you need to decide what color you want against the siding. I decided to start with the sage green which is also the same color as the house, the cream is my base coat and is already on the floor so I need to protect that color while painting on the green.

The square I chose that would be green, I taped the outside portion of the square, so that way the cream or the base color will be protected as the green is painted. Using that green square, alternate every other square taping the outside. When you are finished you will see that you will have large squares and small squares taped off. When tape is removed all squares will be the same size.

Next I will be painting the squares and you will see the finished project. :)

Have a wonderful day :)

*muah*