We’ve been poking our way through making our deck and outdoor living space more enjoyable. The latest: painted Adirondack chairs.
Just ignore the end-of-season horrible garden beds in the back there. Urgh.
We got these chairs last year and I stained them. I didn’t intended to do anything more to them, but I got my hands on a HomeRight Finish Max Fine Finish HVLP (high volume, low pressure) sprayer.
I’ll skip the detailed process because there are a ton of guides out there. Check out Gail at My Repurposed Life for great videos and how-tos.
Obviously, I had to prime the chairs since they were stained. I needed a (1) stain-blocking (2) exterior (3) wood primer. Definitely forgot the stain-blocking part. It’s been two weeks and no stain is showing through, but I’ll keep you updated (I’m sure you’re very concerned about stain leaking through my paint job, right? heh.)
I wanted to pull a color from the umbrella. Brown and orange were out, out of personal preference. Yellow and green were too light (I was scared of that whole stain spotting thing). So blue it was. Mariner by Sherwin Williams was a close-enough match. I got a quart of their exterior latex enamel in high gloss.
I didn’t take any pictures of myself spraying it because my husband took the baby to his parents’ house that afternoon, and setting up a tripod…ugh.
Anyway, two weeks later, we have these chairs that are bright and fun with a lovely brushstroke-free paint job.
The FinishMax has a slight learning curve with adjusting the spray amount, but a quick knob turn on the trigger can fix it. And I learned the hard way (as I usually do) to keep an eye on the extension cord so it doesn’t drag across the fresh paint job.
I can’t imagine priming and painting these by hand. I would have gone crazy with all the nooks and crannies, and frankly, it would have been sloppy because I am not a patient person. This was way easier and, unlike spray paint, I got to choose an exact color.
Clean up was a pain, but only because it required thoroughness, which I find tedious. Again with that patience thing. Dried paint = bad. All it took was warm, soapy water though. I’ll probably avoid ever using oil-based anything in it just because I detest solvents.
Now I suppose I need to paint the royal blue plant stands, but that can wait a season. It feels weird painting brand new things.
Anyone need something painted?! I know a lady who can hook you up with a sweet paint job. (It’s me. I’m the lady.)
Disclaimer: HomeRight provided a Finish Max Fine Finish HVLP Sprayer for this and future projects. All opinions and wrong primer usage are my own.
