Exterior Emulsion: how to use it, and how much you need

Clean the wall and let it dry, fill cracks, then one coat of exterior primer. Two thin coats of emulsion follow, four to six hours apart. Do not paint in direct afternoon heat or within a day of rain.

• Roller and tray setask us to source it
• 2 inch cutting brushask us to source it
• Painter tapeask us to source it

• Exterior primerask us to source it
• Wall puttyask us to source it
• Sandpaper 80-gritask us to source it

• Safety glovesask us to source it
• Dust maskask us to source it
• Safety gogglesask us to source it

• Skipping primer on fresh plaster, so the paint lifts within a season
• One thick coat instead of two thin ones — it looks fine wet and patchy dry
• Painting a damp wall after rain, which traps moisture and blisters
• Thinning more than the tin allows, which quietly destroys coverage

• Check the batch date — emulsion older than about a year in store can seed badly
• Buy one extra tin over the estimate rather than risk a second batch with a slightly different shade
• Match the primer to the paint system; a cheap primer undoes an expensive topcoat