This is the time of year when you might start to notice any defects or problems with your external decorating. Cold weather, high winds, frost and heavy rainfall are going to expose any frailties in the protection that external paintwork is supposed to give to wooden window and door frames, and the soffits beneath the…
Already the phones at Parvin Towers are ringing off the hook. Can you park a van outside our house until the election’s over? Or lend us a “Wet Paint” sign for our front door? There are serious questions to be asked of all parties: for example is Dulux’s “Striking Cyan” washable paint an anti-Labour or…
It’s a question that comes up frequently. With Farrow & Ball paints often costing twice or three times as much as comparable Deluxe and Crown paints – both good quality brands – is it really worth paying the extra? Will you be able to tell the difference? From a professional decorator’s viewpoint, here’s what I…
You heard it here first. Before even the first sighting of a Santa, before a single sparkle of tinsel in a shop window, I can reveal next year’s Colour of the Year. Akzo Nobel – Dulux to you and me – must have their colour elves on piece-work, because according to my watch it’s only just…
I tried DIY brain surgery once. My very good friends have pointed out that perhaps I should have saved up for a professional job. But British Gas, while waiting for their kettle to boil, have been doing some calculations on the back of a reply-paid envelope and now tell us that British home-owners spend £34 billion a year fixing…
For once I’ll be serious. At least for a bit. If you own property in London you probably keep a close watch on property price trends. If not you must have nerves of steel. Latest figures from the ONS suggest a 4.4pc fall in London house prices over the last year (compared to a rise…
Call me biased, but I’ve always loved the Fulham and Putney area. It’s about as close to the centre of London as you can get but still feel like you live somewhere else. And it’s home to plenty of good tradesmen. Modesty forbids me from claiming to be the best decorator amongst them, but in…
We recently completed a large school redecorating project for the Florida State University London annexe on Great Russell Street. The work included 24 student flats, all completed in a very tight time-frame over the student break.
Forget Brexit. Forget the Party Conferences. The real news of the week is next year’s Dulux Colour Of The Year. Now it may be easy to get a cheap laugh at the expense of the people whose job it is to entice us with new colours that reflect our collective subconscious hopes, ambitions and fears. (That,…
Recently we’ve seen some customers getting very creative with their use of different shades of white and it got me thinking. Always dangerous. It won’t surprise you to hear that white is the most popular paint colour. But white comes in a wide range of shades – even “Pure Brilliant White” can vary considerably between manufacturers. Here’s…
I’ve always thought the biggest danger to interior walls comes from, well, accidents. People like me trying to put up shelves, or spilling a glass of wine when England score a penalty. Not a bit of it. It’s children. They make you and me look like amateurs. And London kids are among the worst. Insurance…
If I pick a horse in the Grand National it’s the one with the funniest name. It’s hard not to use the same method for picking paint colours. Paint companies secretly employ teams of captive poets to come up with those names, which explains why poetry as an art form has become very rare. Automatic blending machines are making…
When I was just a lad, I convinced my Dad to let me decorate my own room. Today, as my bank account waves farewell to yet another mortgage payment, I spare my Dad a thought as I think what the orange wallpaper and purple paint did to the value of the family home. Regular readers…
The words of Franz Liebekind in Mel Brook’s The Producers: “Churchill! With his cigars. With his brandy. And his rotten painting, rotten! Hitler – there was a painter! He could paint an entire apartment in one afternoon! Two Coats!” It’s my great pleasure to walk in the footsteps of many great men. Isaac Newton said…
Ready for Christmas? Me neither. But I’m getting my retaliation in first with a choice selection of topical commentary and searching questions. For example, what does Sports Direct give its staff for Christmas dinner? About 5 minutes. The office Christmas party - a great opportunity to catch up with people you haven’t seen for 20 minutes. One Christmas,…
2017 is soon going to be soooo last year. Like a confidential Government memo, word has somehow leaked out that GD Parvin is the decorator to have, and we’re booked solid from now to Christmas. But if you’re thinking about having some decorating work done, despair ye not. Our estimating elf is hard at work making…
I was pleased to see a story in the Daily Telegraph comparing various home improvements, and estimating the added value each of them puts on your property. Yes, it’s official – decorating is one of the most cost-efficient ways of adding property value. The online tool takes your property value, the amount you might spend…
If you ever lie awake at night worrying that the paint on the ceiling might fall on you – this is for you. Why does the paint stick to the wall in the first place? One place I never had any trouble sleeping was in chemistry lessons at school, but after a few decades working with paint I…
Dulux have had a tablet or phone-based colour-picking app, aimed at home users, for some time. It’s quite handy – some people love it, others find it a bit gimmicky – but it does tend to make you think about diffferent colour combinations. Now they have a comparable app for professionals. Architects, designers and specifiers…
With Wimbledon just down the road from our offices, and the best summer since – well, since last year – it can be hard to stay tuned in to work. Thankfully, the weather is perfect for exterior painting and you, dear customer, are keeping us busy. And so you should – it’s the perfect time…
Choice of colour is – excuse me – something of a grey area. We’ve all been told for years that we have to paint our houses in neutral colours if we ever want to sell them. But some new research seems to suggest that we’ve all been repressing the urge to splash out in the…
Regular readers will know that my newsletters are always strictly on-message and never stray from the business of painting and decorating. Well, hardly ever. So, as the Spring-cleaning season opens, some TIMELY and RELEVANT words on care of paintwork and walls. Where possible, we hope you’ll avoid the use of power-tools and wire brushes on the…
Maybe it’s genetic, but with the first rays of sun and green shoots starting to peek through, even your humble decorator is starting to think of spring-cleaning. I thought some tips on handling paintwork might not be amiss. You most likely have some form of emulsion paint on your walls. If we did the painting,…
A brave daffodil in my garden has just started to put shoots up. Of course, that makes me think it must be spring, and now I will probably forget to wear a jacket and catch my death of cold. But it did occur to me that this is a very good time to get an early start…
This story is probably not true, but it’s so good that it ought to be, and I think I will go ahead and believe it anyway. And it came from a respectable newspaper. The word quiz, according to an article by the Guardian’s cricket correspondent, was invented on a bet: “It was in 1791, so…
A while ago I discovered that oikodomophobia is a new and terrible disease, the fear of having oiks come round to your house and make a mess of it. It often leads to a farpotshket decorating job (farpotshket – a yiddish word meaning “broken because someone tried to fix it”). So if you have a farpotshket wardrobe,…
People who value my opinion – yes, both of them – sometimes want to know what’s the best way to prepare for the decorators. Apart from leaving the country, I tell them, there are some sensible things to bear in mind. We’ll assume that you already know what paint you want, that you have chosen…
The great comedian Tommy Cooper once said: “I painted my wife in oils. Now she looks like a sardine”. But that’s not why I’m writing to you. The clever people at Dulux have come up with a new version of their Tablet app to see how your room would look with a new coat of…
We are currently putting finishing touches to a project on West Hill in Wandsworth. The property is a substantial Georgian mansion, tastefully converted into nine well-sized flats as well as a converted stables building, a gate house, and an adjoining Orangery. It may well have been originally built as a country retreat for a wealthy London…
If you’re not so much of a big kid as I am, then I apologise in advance for what follows. But the fact is I love London. I’ve been painting and decorating all over the city from our Putney offices since 1997, and I continually find out wonderful facts about the place. What, for instance, would you…
