Choosing the right paint colour is only one step in making your newly decorated room look amazing, how that paint is applied and finished also has a massive impact.

Here’s five top tips for painting your home to make sure you end up with a finished room to be proud of...

1. Prepare the surface

If you want a stunning end result, it is crucial you take as much time as is needed to get your walls and ceilings in the right state for painting. All surfaces need to be clean, dust-free, smooth and dry so the paint goes on properly.

Wash down the walls with detergent and rinse with clean water before allowing them to dry. Any holes, or grooves also need to be filled and rubbed down to ensure your walls are blemish free.

2. Mix paints for a consistent colour

Although you may be using the same paint its colour is likely to vary slightly from can to can. What you want to avoid is having to open a new can halfway through painting a room and to find that there is a discernible difference in tones. To avoid this, work out roughly how much paint you need and mix them all in a larger bucket, so you are working from one batch of paint.

3. Buy quality brushes and rollers

If you have spent time and money on high quality paint, it doesn’t make sense to skimp on brushes, rollers or painter tape. By buying high quality kit, the paint will apply better and the tape will work better sealing out any dribbles.

4. Keep a wet edge to avoid lap marks

Lap marks are the name for the stripes that appear when you roll over paint that’s already dry. To avoid this, you must keep a wet edge, so each pass of the roller goes over the previous stroke before the paint begins to dry. A good, more in-depth description of how this can be achieved can be found here.

5. Use a roller to paint along edges

When you paint up tight to door frames or skirting boards with a paint brush, you should also go over it with a small roller to ensure the texture around the edges is the same as the rest of the wall. Do this by brushing on the paint, then rolling it out before the paint dries.