Rice pudding walls!

[GS70]

The wall surface in the kitchen extension of the house I've just bought is very lumpy. (there's a photo in my album but I don't know how to link to it here!) I don't know what the surface is, there's no uniformity to the lumps and bumps, it definitely isn't artex, could it just be painted cement?

To get a smooth surface could I do it myself with that Polycell smoothing stuff, or is it difficult to use and requires a fairly smooth wall to start with?

The paint that's on the walls has a sheen to it, would this have to be removed before it can be plastered over?

 

[tommyl18]

Hi ive looked at your photos and that is one crazy wall especially the colours ! it looks like some form of sand and cement mix that has been splashed or brushed on to the wall hard to tell from the photos wether the big lumps are stones or not? regards covering it over i know someone who has used that polycell and he spent hours sanding it down but i dont think it would be much good on that wall in your photo because the wall would need bonding over first as the finish you have at the moment is to rough just to skim over the second problem you have is that the paint looks like a kitchen or bathroom paint which is waterproof so the bonding or plaster probably wont stick anyway so the options you have is to either board the wall and skim the boards or really rough the wall up with something to create a good key and then bond and skim it you you could apply a neat mix of pva mixed with sand and let that go off and that should give you a good key to apply bonding coat to

 

[GS70]

Thanks very much for your reply Tommy. Yes, the colours are hard work, aren't they? The blue bit is where the room was redecorated without the notice board being removed!

From what you say it sounds like boarding and skimming is the way most likely to get good results, am I right in thinking that would mean the kitchen cupboards would need to be removed and rehung on the new boards? Apologies if that's an idiotic question!

If I go the way of roughing up the walls rather than using boards, would I need to rough up the wall before applying the neat pva and sand, or would that be instead of roughing up the wall? Is the pva the 'bonding coat' you mention?

Ta!