Hey folks — after a bit of experienced input on prepping plaster before paint.

Had a mate help with the plastering (absolute legend, did it for free), so no complaints — he did a way better job than I ever could. That said, after everything dried, there were a few imperfections that needed sorting. Possibly no other choice than to go in hard with sanding to level them out… but now I’m wondering if I’ve gone too far.

Some parts feel smooth, others have that gritty, almost sandy texture, like I’ve taken off the top layer of finish. I’ve done a standard mist coat (70/30 water to matt emulsion) on one wall, but it hasn’t fully settled my nerves. The wall still feels quite porous or inconsistent in suction, and I’m now wondering if that mist coat is actually going to hold.

So the big question: Was over-sanding the real issue here? And now that I’ve mist coated — should I still prime over the top (thinking Zinsser Gardz or Peel Stop), or crack on with filler and topcoat?

Just to make things more exciting, I’ve ended up with a fancy mixed bag of paints from Facebook Marketplace: • Farrow & Ball Dead Flat (one room) • Little Greene Absolute Matt (another) • Dulux Heritage Matt (in the third)

I know F&B Dead Flat is especially unforgiving, so I don’t want to waste time or money putting high-end paint on a surface that might not hold up.

Would love to hear from anyone who’s tackled rough plaster, over-sanding, and high-end finishes. Stick with the mist coat? Prime it all now? Have I already doomed myself?

Cheers in advance — much appreciated.

I’m totally new to the world of plastering and have done a few hours of reading online now about plaster and I have to say, I’m a bit confused as to what will work and what won’t.

I have unfinished concrete block walls whose interior surface I want to finish with plaster.

After reading an article in finehomebuilding ( https://www.finehomebuilding.com/project-guides/drywall/hybrid-approach-lime-plaster)

I went down to my local Building supply yard and got a bag of Type S Dolomitic Lime…pretty much the only readily available stuff in the states and I mixed it up 3:1 with masons sand into a putty, I wet down the concrete wall in an inconspicuous place and trowled the mixture on about 1/8 inch thick and let it set up over a couple days periodically wetting it down.

Well, best I can tell it seems to be working. It’s hard and sticks to the wall and looks halfway decent…

Yet, I’m nervous before adventuring with this onto the entire structure because I hear so much conflicting advice about what will and won’t work.

The bag of lime I have says to mix with a gauging plaster but I didn’t do that. What benefit would a gauging plaster give me that I don’t already have with my simple lime mixture?

So, I’m opening this topic up here to get others input. Seems like there are many methods that work…as so far my weird one seems to have but would still like more experienced input.

I'm doing some DIY in my attic so I can donit up for my daughter. Once I rip this off then will it need plasterboard & then plaster or...?

I've recently bought my first ever house. After stripping some botched liner paper in the bedroom, the walls look like this. Very textured, full of filled-in holes, and have a few of these weird bubble things. I want to do this properly but as I'm new to this kind of thing, I'm not sure what the first step to do before decorating is. Is this going to need a whole skim coat or would just filling and sanding the worst bits be enough? What do I do about the bubbles? Or should I just put some more liner paper up and forget about what's underneath? Any advice would be much appreciated!

Just bought a new house which has 4 layers of wallpaper all over the place. Previous owners were here around 30 years so it’s in need of some updating.

Trying to take all the wallpaper down (with a steamer) so we can paint but I’ve come across this plaster underneath.

As you can see, there are a few cracks but also this hole which leads so some kind of wood underneath. Is this normal?

The main question is how should I go about repairing this. Is it possible to fills the holes and the cracks, prime and then paint over?