Matte vs Eggshell vs Semi Gloss Paint

Matte vs Eggshell vs Semi Gloss Paint | Edmonton Painter Explains

Hey guys, welcome back to the Walls Revived YouTube channel. Again, I'm interviewing Leann from Walls Revived.

She is a color specialist as well as an amazing painter. So, today we're going to be talking about different sheen or finishes of paint that you can select for your home, what they mean, when you should apply them, and all questions in between.

So, let's get started with the different types and then we can talk about different applications.

What Paint Sheen Actually Means

Oh, for sure. I mean, it's a big can of worms and it also depends on the paint provider that you use and of course I use Benjamin Moore, so I'm going to mostly talk about them.

And it goes all the way from flat to high gloss and all the ones in between.

And the most typical one for your walls is eggshell.

And you might ask what does that mean? Like you said earlier, you hold up an egg sort of.

So sheen to begin with is how shiny your walls are. That's kind of the layman's terms.

Some people like high gloss. If you watch movies sometimes, I of course notice this. There's a lot of high gloss backgrounds and I'm like why?

And that's very kind of I'm not going to say impractical, but there's so many things to talk about.

High gloss shows all the imperfections in the walls, whereas matte hides stuff.

So, another road to go down is new homes. And a lot of painters, here's the thing.

So painters have the choice of the products that they can use, which is weird and we need to avoid that and stuff, but so a lot of the new home painters choose a very low sheen paint, almost a matte.

And that means that it hides the flaws so they don't have to do as much work.

Sorry guys, it's true though.

But a lot of feedback I get when I go to repaint new homes is they're like, "What's with this paint on the walls? We can't wash it. It's really low quality."

And yeah, there's a few reasons for that is because the painters got to choose which paint product they're going to use for the touch-up capabilities and whatnot.

But yeah, it's just it's really not practical for everyday living.

So that's why we go with eggshell.

Roundabout, go back to that whole topic.

Eggshell is usually a little bit more user friendly and you can wash it.

Especially if you have a home with children, small children, or even just walls get dirty, right?

They get marks, they get smudges from people's hands and whatever, and you have to be able to clean it off without wiping the paint right off.

Exactly.

Flat, Matte, Eggshell, Satin, and Gloss

So I mean if you have a flat paint, they also show finger marks and things like that very easily.

Kind of like when you touch something that's kind of matte and you can see the oil that your hands leave behind.

Same thing on the walls.

Not practical for every home.

Flat paint, it almost you can even feel it. And there's texture difference too between the different sheen and flat and matte.

It's almost chalky actually, like a chalkboard.

And that actually what lime wash is. We go into that topic too. It's chalky, right?

So yeah, oils from your fingers, you can definitely. It's a beautiful finish. I love it. I have it in my own house. I have matte, but I'm very careful. I'm not touching my walls.

But the higher sheen, the more durability that's what you get.

So we've got flat, matte, usually eggshell or there's low sheen in there, too. The low sheen, eggshell, satin, pearl, semi gloss, gloss, high gloss.

High gloss. Super, super shiny, but very durable. You can easily wipe that.

And that's why in the olden days and still today, bathrooms and kitchens were done in a semi gloss or high gloss just cuz it's practical, right?

Easy to clean. Wipe things down.

That's right.

But also back in the day it was a lovely lacquer based paint, nice oil based paint.

That's very true.

It flowed nice. It was nice and durable and lasted a long time.

Yeah. It was just a better quality of paint.

It was. Honestly, it was.

And then over the years, cuz they took out the VOCs, the volatile organic compounds, they brought those down, but when that happened, it really compromised the durability of the paint.

Yeah. So, I think sometimes they are actually bringing back some VOCs just a little bit just to make that paint a little bit more durable, which is important, right?

You don't want to have to repaint your walls every couple years.

Durability and Paint Quality

So, with that, when it comes to the durability, is it that the paint cracks or it's weaker or just wipes off?

There's a bunch of things.

Durability. So for Benjamin Moore, they're higher end paints. In general they are higher end paints than other ones.

But if you go with the top of the line one and you get a deep color, like a purple or red, and you go to wash it or wipe it will stay intact.

And I have come across a homeowner provided some paint for me and it was like a purple color and when I was painting I went to wipe some paint off the wall and my rag actually had the purple on it.

And I'm like, "Oh, okay."

Oh, no.

Yeah. And you don't want that, of course, right?

So, the higher quality paints are like you can't wipe them off, right? You shouldn't be able to.

That's important.

So, you do a number of projects throughout the city of Edmonton and St. Albert.

You just bought a house. What area of town did you buy your house?

The older area, in Grandon in St. Albert. I think it's relabeled the gardens. But anyways, most people remember it as.

And for your own home being a painter and someone with a design eye, what types of sheen are you looking for in your house?

Are you going to do a combo or is there one, going to go builder beige everywhere or what are you doing?

Well, okay. So, and believe me, I've spent many, many hours trying to figure this out.

Eggshell builder beige. There we go.

Yeah. Well, beige is actually coming back. It's trendy right now.

So for my own personal house, it's 1974, I think. 76, something like that.

That's a good year.

Okay. And because I moved a couple walls, there was a stipple ceiling, right? The popcorn ceiling that everyone hates.

And so I have an excuse to get rid of it.

And because it's that old of a house, there's most likely asbestos in there.

So rather than take that chance and scrape it off, which you don't want to do because that's when you disturb asbestos, we encapsulated it with drywall.

So yes, I'm losing half an inch of the height of my ceiling, but I'm going to have a flat ceiling now to play with.

And what you do, and everyone wants a flat ceiling nowadays, you got to prime it first, but then you want very little sheen on it, right?

So flat, you want flat, but not all flat paints are made the same.

And of course with Benjamin Moore, I'm using the premium 508 ceiling paint, so it's ultra flat and you don't want to see the roller marks or anything like that, right?

Because the sun is shining through those windows. You don't want to see it.

So of course I'm going to go with the highest quality paint.

That's for my ceilings.

For my walls, I've lived with matte.

I've lived with Scuff-X Matte, which is actually like a shiny eggshell.

I've experimented, right?

And yes, eggshell is practical, but I love the look of Ulti-Matte.

It's just I don't know how to describe it. It's beautiful, right?

But you have to take care living with Ultimatte, right?

And I do educate my clients on the different types of sheen.

And I'm like, do you have young kids? Do you have pets? Do you wash your walls?

And some of them are like, no, I still want the Ultimatte.

I'm like, "Okay, just to let you know, this is what you're going to have to deal with."

And just like, "Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm all for it."

I'm like, "Okay, just a disclaimer, right?"

It's beautiful. It's a beautiful finish. It's almost like a velvety look.

So, I'm going to do that.

Or I actually might do a faux lime wash in the main walls cuz that's quite popular, too, now.

And I did that recently and it turned out really well.

Why not actual lime wash?

Well, that one because you can wipe off the lime wash.

Oh, okay. We don't want that.

No, we don't want that cuz every occasionally you do have to wipe your walls and you don't want to actually wipe off the lime wash.

Choosing Paint Sheen for Different Areas

So, let's talk more about what else we need to know about the paint finish, the paint sheen that people should select for their homes or maybe different areas.

Yes, of course.

So, in general, we do eggshells for the walls.

But depending on the line of paint. So, for the most part, I use Benjamin Moore Regal eggshell. That's kind of my go-to.

But if you have a busy household, I might upgrade you to Scuff-X.

But because Scuff-X is meant to just bounce off the walls because of that, it's more durable, so it's shinier.

So that's where I go Scuff-X matte, which is like an eggshell.

But past that for doors and trims we want that to be a bit shinier because you are wiping off, that's touchable points, right?

So we usually want a semi gloss for doors and trims or at the very least a satin pearl.

You do kind of want that contrast.

You don't need it, but that kind of standard is semi gloss for doors and trims.

Yeah. And it looks good. Easy to clean, easy to wash because you should wash your baseboards every once in a while. The dust that accumulates and whatever.

Okay, that's awesome.

Is there anything we missed that I haven't asked you about for you being the expert painter?

For sure.

One thing comes to mind and there was that trend where you paint certain things black and it's still lingering and it still looks good on certain occasions, right?

But people are like, "Well, I want matte black."

Okay, it looks great when the painter first, when we finish it, but it's so hard to maintain.

Okay, so just beware if you have matte black in your house, don't touch it.

Or any dark colors that have been done in matte. It's hard to touch up. It really is.

You almost have to repaint the whole wall.

So, just buyer beware if you want these cool designer colors, just beware.

Yeah. So when it comes to having, if you want the more fancy designer finishes that look great in magazines, just know that once the magazine shoot's done, that gets torn down.

Actually living in the space is different.

So even if you rub against it, you can see a scuff mark on certain things.

You're almost burnishing it pretty much, right?

Yeah. So, I have seen in some new homes where they just do that single color scheme, everything is the same color and it's usually white.

Please, let's get away from that.

Painters, some painters love it because they just have their spray machines and they're just doing everything the same color, right?

But it's not practical to put matte or an eggshell even on their built-in cabinets inside the closets.

I've come across that, too.

And I've heard complaints, right, from my clients who are getting me to repaint.

They're just like, "It scuffs up so easy."

I'm like, "Well, yeah, it's the improper sheen, right?"

It's beautiful when it's first done, but not practical.

Yeah. As soon as you use it, it's messed up.

Yeah. Exactly.

All right. Awesome.

Well, if you are in the Edmonton region, Edmonton, St. Albert, Sherwood Park, any area within Edmonton you're looking for paint consultation, color consult, look to Leann at Walls Revived.

She'll come out and look at your job and give you the right recommendation for what type of paint, what type of color, and sheen for your home.

Thank you so much, Leann. We appreciate it.

No problem.

We'll see you guys on the next one. Bye.