PUTTY: Repairing Victorian Plaster Walls Ourselves
We only had a small area of the full room re-plastered in lime due to cost. The rest of the walls were far from perfect but the cost would be out of budget to do the full room. To reduce spend our plan for the remainder of the room was to repair rather than replace. We have produced a full guide on how we restored some of our lime plaster walls available here: Repairing Lime Plaster Walls – Hiding The Cracks.
There was a decent amount of the lime finishing plaster left over from the main job and the plasterers showed us how we could apply this to smooth out imperfections in the remaining original plaster.
Filling Holes & Cracks
The first task at hand was to fill some of the larger cracks and holes in the original lime. For this we used a lime putty. Standard fillers should not be used with lime plaster. Poly Filler or similar products, firstly are not breathable but secondly we have found that they sand down differently to lime. When painted, if you look closely you will see the transition in the lime plaster finish.
The image below shows a small wall beneath the window that was in need of repair. Here we have filled some larger wholes and cracks with lime putty and sanded it off with some 120 grit sandpaper. It looks a bit of a mess but the cracks were large!
When filling any holes in lime plaster it is important to note that you may need a couple of applications before you can begin sanding. The reason for this is that the existing lime will suck out the moisture from the putty and pull it inwards. A second application should be enough to bring the hole level.
Applying Some Fresh Lime Top Coat
Once all larger holes and cracks were closed we covered the space with lime finishing plaster and smoothed it off.
Once again you can see our full guide to repairing lime plaster walls by visiting this post: Repairing Lime Plaster Walls – Hiding The Cracks. Our old living room wall restoration was now taking shape and it was time to start spreading the paint.
Go to the next page below (Page 4) to see our PAINT activities.