Interior painting on the Costa Blanca

Refreshing the white in the living room changes more than you’d think

One of the most frequent calls we get in autumn-winter is from owners who haven’t painted the home they live in for eight or ten years and realise the walls aren’t white anymore, they’re a hard-to-pin-down grey-yellow. Mediterranean light is brutal on walls. Cheap whites yellow from slow oxidation, especially in rooms with direct sun or near a kitchen where steam and airborne oil reach. Furniture marks, splashes accumulated over time and small corner knocks all add up.

When you repaint with proper white emulsion in two coats, the room changes radically and the effect goes beyond aesthetics. The sense of space grows. Light reflects better off the walls, so you need less artificial light. Furniture looks cleaner by contrast. And, simply, living in an up-to-date painted home feels different from one overdue for a refresh. A modest investment with disproportionate impact on daily wellbeing.

Paint types and where they go

Matt emulsion is the standard for ceilings and walls of bedrooms, living rooms and dining rooms. Uniform reflection-free finish, hides substrate imperfections, easy to apply. For high-traffic areas (corridors, stairs, hallway) and kids’ bedrooms where walls get dirtier, we recommend washable satin emulsion, slight sheen but lets you wipe stains with a damp cloth without damaging the paint.

For wet zones (kitchens, bathrooms) there are specific anti-damp and anti-mould emulsions that resist condensation and vapour without generating black mould stains. Application needs primer with fungicide if the wall already has mould traces.

For doors, frames, skirting and any interior carpentry, synthetic or water-based enamel. Water-based acrylic is what we use most today: fast-drying, no solvent smell, washable, durable. Applied with spray or very-short-pile roller for smooth finish. Never brush on large surfaces because it leaves marks.

Textured ceiling smoothing

70s, 80s and 90s homes on the Costa Blanca often have textured (gotelé) ceilings and walls. A textured relief coating standard at the time, now dated, perceived by current buyers as old-fashioned. Smoothing the texture restores modern flat walls and allows any decor.

The process is labour-intensive. We apply thick levelling compound over the texture and let it partially dry. We sand with orbital sander until the surface is fully flat. We apply sealing primer and two coats of emulsion. Sanding generates considerable dust, so we cover the whole room with plastic before starting and vacuum carefully at the end. A standard 15 m² room smoothed and painted takes 2-3 days.

Pro process versus botched

People often say painting is easy. True, anyone can pick up a roller. The difference between amateur and pro result is in the steps before and after that the amateur skips. Covering furniture, floors and skirting with proper plastic. Applying precise masking tape on edges and corners. Filling small holes and cracks with specific compound before painting, not after. Sanding between coats for perfect finish. Applying primer where the wall needs it. Removing the tape before paint fully cures. Those details separate paint that lasts 8-10 years from paint that looks careless within a month.