I was repainting a small interior wall with an orange peel texture. I've repainted other walls without issue but on this cursed wall I screwed up in just about every way imaginable. Long story short, after trying to scrub and scrape off the new paint while it was still wet and only partially succeeding, there are places that look like this:
There are three layers visible here. From top to bottom:
- My interior water-based acrylic eggshell paint + primer
- The previous owner's layer of water-based acrylic exterior eggshell paint + primer (which they inexplicably used indoors)
- Some white material which may be another layer of paint, primer, or possibly just the original wall texture.
I've been trying to read about fixing issues like this, but every article I read seems to assume a flat surface and talks about sanding the surface. However, I imagine that if I sand the wall, I'm going to flatten out and ruin the orange peel texture wherever I sand.
I can think of a few solutions here, but I'm not sure which is most appropriate or if there's another solution I can't find:
- Completely sand all paint and texture off of the wall until it's flat, and then re-texture and repaint it (this seems like a nightmare worst-case scenario!)
- Use paint thinner or some other solvent to remove some of the paint without removing the texture (don't know if this is even possible) and then repaint it.
- Spray texture directly over the worst regions (if it will even stick to eggshell) and then repaint.
I'd like to be able to fix it myself, but given how badly I screwed up, if the solution isn't easy then I should probably have a professional do it. However, I'd like to have a good understanding of what's involved so I know the pro isn't either trying to rip me off or cutting corners.
