How to sand and paint floors

Remedy bland floors forever by transforming your boards with a luxurious lick of paint – low cost, high impact! As ever, the key to a truly fabulous finish is in the preparation.

shopping list

• nail punch
• hammer
• industrial and rotary edge floor sanders
• selection of grades of sandpaper
• masking tape
• goggles and face mask
• sugar soap
• sponge
• knotting fluid
• primer
• lint-free cloth
• white spirit
• paint
• paint stirrer
• selection of paint brushes

TOP TIP: Remember to start painting at the furthest point from the door to allow yourself an easy exit!

1 Sanding floorboards is a messy old job but fundamental to the best results. You will need to hire an industrial floor sander and a smaller rotary sander for the edges, as well as three grades of sandpaper: coarse, medium and fine.

First tap down any protruding nails to just below the surface with a nail punch and hammer. Small gaps between boards add character, but if you are worried about bigger gaps then glue in narrow pieces of wood to fill. Seal around the door with masking tape.

2 Fit a coarse sheet of sandpaper to the sander (your machine will come with instructions), put on your goggles and face mask and sand in diagonal strips across the floor, overlapping slightly to ensure good coverage.

The machine will move of its own accord when switched on, so some restraint will be necessary to keep a slow, steady pace. Tilt the machine backwards when stopping and starting and, most importantly, keep it moving when it is on or it will gouge the boards.

3 Now to change to the rotary sander and fit it with the coarse sandpaper. Work carefully around the edges of the room where the large sander did not reach. Take care not to damage skirting boards and door.

4 Fit the large sander with medium grade paper but this time work up and down the length of the boards, again overlapping each strip slightly. Switch to the edge sander using the same grade of paper. Finally, working with the fine grade paper, sand the length of the boards once more, repeating with the edge sander as before.

5 Vacuum the floor, sugar soap the boards and wipe over with a cloth dampened with white spirit to ensure it is completely dust-free. Mask off skirting boards and doorframes and prepare the new wood for painting with knotting fluid and a primer.

6 Stir the paint thoroughly and start to paint in the corner the furthest away from the door, using the largest brush you feel comfortable with, but not one that is wider than the boards themselves (a 75mm brush is a good size). Paint the whole length of one or two boards at a time, switching to a smaller brush (25mm) where the floor meets the skirting boards and walls to allow a finer application of paint.

7 When dry, lightly sand by hand, vacuum and wipe as before, and apply a second coat. Paint doesn't reach its full hardness until three or four days afterwards, so avoid excessive wear and tear on the area. Clean your brushes thoroughly after use.

Extracted from A Girl's Guide to Decorating by Abigail Ahern, published by Quadrille, £16.99, photography by Grahams Atkins-Hughes.

Read our review of A Girl's Guide to Decorating on our blog.