We love white boards. We can scribble fast, get my thoughts out, erase, put up new thoughts, erase again, tweak, erase, and generally flesh out an idea in very short order, much faster than I can on a computer. That’s just the way we work. But for some reason, white boards are REALLY expensive. No clue why, but they are so we never have enough room to write because we get fairly small boards. We’re constantly making my writing smaller and smaller as we go down the board or we end up with really tiny sketches that we can’t figure out the next day.
Recently we went looking for a cheaper alternative white board and stumbled upon IdeaPaint. The company makes chalkboard and dry erase paints. In fact one of their products is a clear dry erase paint so we can paint directly on top of existing colors. So we decided to give it a whirl and sure enough, we love it! A lot of folks have asked about the process and let’s face it, who doesn’t want to write on your walls, so here’s the process from start to finish along with some first-hand tips.
IdeaPaint comes in a very simple kit which includes This, That, a Roller, a mixing stick and a can opener.
Each kit is good for 50 Square Feet. If you order more than 50 Square Feet at a time, you get multiple kits. Once you mix everything, you have one hour to paint and you cannot store any unused paint, so make sure you’re ready for all of your painting before you mix.
Typically IdeaPaint goes on entire walls, but in our case, we essentially made big dry erase boards in the middle of our walls. After all, we can’t reach the top of our 9 foot walls so that would just be a waste to paint it up there. Everything was taped off with blue painter’s tape.
Once everything was taped off, we simply mixed This into That, stirred for 30 seconds, then let it rest for 2 minutes per the instructions.
The paint has a water like consistency as you can see below. So if you go back up to the picture of Nicole’s office, you’ll see we taped a dropcloth to the wall because the paint will drip when rolling simply because it’s so watery. That just helps to keep the drips off the wall, though it’s VERY easy to paint over any drips later.
The instructions tell you to cut in the edges with a small foam roller or a foam brush, but we did fine using a regular brush just for the cut ins. Since we’re only painting over a portion of the walls, it’s very obvious where the dry erase “board” is because the color gets a little darker and it has a very shiny gloss to it. Originally we were planning to install some trim on either side of the board, but it’s so obvious, it’s not necessary.
Nicole’s wall freshly painted.
Nicole’s wall with the tape removed. As you can see, the “board” is very obvious on the wall so no trim is necessary, but the color of the wall shows through the paint. The sign on the bottom tells folks not to write on the wall yet.
When painting, there is definitely a strong odor initially from the paint so be sure to ventilate well. Really for just the first 30 minutes as the smell does go away very quickly. But the smell did permeate our entire facility for the first 30 minutes. We actually painted both rooms first thing in the morning so we could open the doors and let fresh air in rather than painting last thing and then closing up the building.
Once the paint dries, there is conflicting information between the paint kit and the website on curing time before you can use the dry erase wall. The kit says 4 days but the website says 7 days. So we went with the 7 day wait. Nicole took the first stabs at writing on the wall in the conference room…..
The instructions note that you need to use a microfiber cloth to fully clean the walls and they’re correct. What we do is use a regular dry erase eraser to take most of the drawing off the wall and then go over that with the microfiber cloth. It’s an extra step, but honestly well worth it.
So far we have IdeaPaint in the Conference Room, Nicole’s Office, Machine Room and even a small board in the kitchen using two complete kits. I’m ordering two more kits for my office and another wall in the Conference Room. This truly is IdeaPaint ready for my inspirations whenever they strike. Very cool stuff and we’d recommend it if you’re looking for a nice white board writing space, but don’t want to have to purchase and hang a white board. C’mon, it’s fun to write on walls!
BISCARDI CREATIVE MEDIA is a full service digital media production company near Atlanta, Georgia with services that include Video Production, Sound Production, Sound Mixing, Graphic Design, Animation, Post Production, Video Editing, Color Grading, Finishing, Digital Asset Transfer, Digitizing and Archiving. Quite simply we’re the people who make video and media production easy for you. No technobabble. Just clear, concise and creative content delivered where and how you need it, on time and on budget. Office and production space is also available for short and long term projects. www.biscardicreative.com | 770-271-3427
Wow, this is cool. I’m going to see if I can do this in my office at work, too.
How long does it last? Do you have to repaint?
I had the paint on the walls for about 3 years at the time I sold the building. It was still good to work at that time. You just want to keep the walls cleaned. Don’t leave the dry erase up for more than a few weeks.