I have moved into a 1920s house that needs quite a bit of plastering work. Thinking of going to the local technical college for a plastering course - there’s a few on offer that typically last 4 days, cost around 250 quid. Has anyone had experience of taking a short plastering course like this as a home-improver / DIYer?
From what I understand, plastering is quite easy to have a go at, but takes a lot of experience to do well. So I’m wondering what sort of walls I could expect to take on after a mere 4 days.
A good thing about my house, though, is that the plaster is generally in reasonable nick, so I’d be looking at doing skims to put a fresh, even surface on, rather than any full-monty back to the brick affairs. No ceiling work either.
I don’t know about the UK, but “big box” home improvement stores (Home Depot etc) here sometimes offer free classes on various DIY skills. Although plastering (assuming you’re talking lathe and plaster, as opposed to drywall hanging and finishing,) might be a bit esoteric in that venue.
I have done some plastering under the tutelage of someone who did it well, and he always did my part over. He was like a sculptor, I was a kid throwing mud on the wall. I stopped trying. A four day course might be enough to get you to do reasonable work. I would time the course so that you begin to work on your house immediately (maybe even concurrently, if you have the energy). I lived in many NYC apartments that were plastered and I found that even professionals who said they could do it often did a poor job.
I have found that the big box “classes” that chiroptera refers to are usually just shills for some product. They are short and offer little to none hands on. You can do better by just browsing youtube (which would be next to useless for plastering).
Good luck.
Thks chiroptera, I’m sort of talking about lath and plaster, but I wouldn’t need to get involved with any lath in my house - the walls are structurally in good shape. They’re rough and uneven in places, though, so I’m interested in learning how to skim plaster them to put a finish on for decorating. As you say, it’s a bit too advanced for the big DIY stores to be laying on a class.
One of my concerns with a class is that we’d basically learn how to skim drywall (called plasterboard over here), which is probably a good skill to have but wouldn’t get me far dealing with a rough wall in an old house.
Thks Ethelbert - it looks like something that would take a lot of time to get handy at, no doubt.
This bloke here is making it look easy mind, this is the type of thing I need doing;
I think taking that class is a great idea. I wish I had access to something like that around here. I’ve skim coated several walls and ceilings of my house. You can learn it yourself if you are comfortable with figuring that kind of stuff out, but it will be a lot easier to learn from an expert.
Working with plaster is very technique dependent. This is different than many other DIY projects which are just a matter of following directions. With plaster, you have to know the proper consistency, how much to put on, how much to take off, how to take it off so it’s smooth, and how to sand. If you mess up with those steps, you may not notice until you paint and it looks bad.
After 4 days I would expect you would be able to tackle everything in your house. It won’t take any time to learn the basics, but after 4 days your technique will likely become professional level. If you have the money to spend, it would be money well spent.
First, I just noticed I spelled lath incorrectly. :smack:
There’s definitely an art to wall repair, skim coating and texturing, although a 4-day class seems unecessary if you’re not going to hang any wallboard. It’s not really that difficult to do, and forgiving in that you can almost always fix your mistakes.
On the other hand, if you have the time and money to do it and it’s a well-run class, you’ll certainly make fewer mistakes. How is the class structured, though? Because mastering this sort of thing is very hands-on. If the class is going to be mostly show and tell I imagine you could do just as well by looking up tutorials online.
I’m a painting contractor/decorative painter by trade and I’ve seen very nice drywall work done by homeowner “amateurs.”
By far the most important part of that video is the part where the homeowner pays him. The rest of it is just Ron drinking tea, thinking about sex and football and making it look easy.
