Painting Your Hallway - Ideas & Tips

In many flats or houses, the hallway is the first room you enter. It gives a first impression of your home - for you and your guests. It is also often the room where the wardrobe and shoe racks are located. With a new coat of paint, you can give your hallway a modern, friendly and inviting flair in no time.

Table of contents

1. Painting a hallway: Ideas from our community
2. Preparation: How to choose the right colour & paint quantity for your hallway
3. Welcome! The right colours for visually brightening and enlarging the hallway
4. Taping walls properly for different effects
5. Painting a hallway the right way: Instructions from MissPompadour
6. FAQ: Frequently asked questions
7. Material and accessories for painting the hallway

Paint the hallway: Ideas from our community

Preparation: How to choose the right colour & paint quantity for your hallway

Corridors are subject to a lot of wear and tear compared to other rooms - this also applies to the walls. Therefore, you should use hard-wearing pain ts for painting or you can add a "protective layer" to the paint in the last step. In the following, we have summarised which colours are particularly suitable for painting the hallway:

Colour quality

• We particularly recommend our MissPompadour - The Functional Wall Paint for corridors. It creates a pleasant matt surface and is very robust and washable. If you expect the walls to be subjected to very heavy loads, it is the colour of choice!
• But our MissPompadour - The Valuable Wall Paint and our LittlePomp chalk paints as well as the CosyColours chalk-based wall paints are also very resistant and can be spread well in your hallway.

Primer

If your walls have stains such as old oil, soot and ink stains, it is advisable to apply a primer coat of stainblock. This also applies if you want to paint highly absorbent walls, such as plasterboard or fresh plaster, or if you are painting over wallpaper.

The following products are ideal for priming

• To Bond & Block - MissPompadour Primer: Prevents stains and odours from escaping.
  
• MissPompadour - To Prime Walls: Prepares highly absorbent surfaces perfectly for painting.

Paint quantity

For each colour you will find a paint calculator in the shop. It shows you exactly how much paint you need for how much surface area. All you have to do is enter how many square metres you want to paint and select the appropriate surface from the list. You will always find the paint calculator directly next to or below the colour shade. However, the amount indicated may vary depending on the substrate. You also need to bear in mind that you will need more paint for several coats.

Welcome! The right colours to visually brighten and enlarge the hallway

Hallways are usually not very spacious. Particularly in newer houses and flats, space is saved here. This makes it all the more important to consciously consider the wall design of the hallway. On the one hand, you can achieve visual grandeur with the right colour scheme, and on the other hand by keeping the entrance area tidy. If there are also shoe racks and wardrobes in the hallway, built-in furniture is recommended

When designing a hallway, it is important to remember that doors to neighbouring rooms are often open. The wall paints should therefore harmonise with all neighbouring rooms and the staircase. If these wall paints are rather neutral, an intense colour can be chosen for the hallway walls. After all, the hallway is not a room where you spend a lot of time. In general, we recommend creating a concept for the design of the wall paints in all rooms, including the hallway and staircase. Visual highlights can also be created with our MissPompadour wallpapers.

Hallways are enhanced by the colour of the floor and ceiling, but also by carpets or details such as vases and pictures. Large mirrors can also enlarge the room, as can good lighting. You can simply "paint away" elements such as radiators by using the same colour for these objects as for the walls.

Painting a narrow hallway

A long and narrow hallway can easily be made visually larger by painting it two colours, with the end wall darker than the side walls. Horizontal stripes also make the room appear larger. For the colour scheme, you can use light, friendly colours or subtle ones, such as green, which in turn accentuates wooden furniture in vintage or country house style

It is often advisable to design a narrow hallway in more restrained white or grey tones (including the furniture and the floor) and additionally furnish it with decorative accents and accessories. Painting the ceiling in a light colour can also visually enlarge your hallway.

Another idea is to paint the hallway in two colours - be it changing the colour halfway up or emphasising individual areas in a different colour. We explain exactly how this works below.

Painting a dark hallway

Light colours are particularly suitable for dark hallways. You should also brighten up the room with good lighting - warm white light is a good choice here. A light, warm grey and shades of off-white are particularly suitable in this case.

Taping walls correctly for different effects

Painting hallways: Ideas for patterns

The colour shades you choose to paint your hallway depend on the shape and orientation of the hallway, as well as your willingness to experiment.
Especially if the hallway is separated from the other rooms and not openly connected to the house by a staircase, you can experiment a bit - there are no limits to ideas and patterns.
Choose colour shades that complement the rest of your flat or house. Depending on the colour you work with, you can create a Mediterranean flair in the entrance area or a neat country house style. By using natural tones such as beige and grey, your hallway can transition into an adjoining natural interior. With our creative stencils, you can easily create patterns on furniture, walls or even the floor.

Painting the hallway in two colours

By using several colours or painting in two colours, you can visually change the proportions of a room and make it look better

• A dark colour makes a wall look closer than it actually is - this is particularly suitable for short walls. You can paint the parallel side walls in the hallway in a lighter colour shade, which gives the impression that they are further away.
• Another option is to integrate the window or door frames into the colour concept and, for example, paint the walls in a light grey and the frames in a beautiful white.
• Painting the ceiling in a bright, bold tone again enlarges the hallway.
• Or you can add stripes. Horizontal stripes visually reduce the height of the wall, create a sense of depth and make the room look wider. So they are a good choice for a narrow hallway with high ceilings.
• Vertical stripes are recommended for low ceilings because they visually enlarge the interior space. Colour gradients can also create beautiful accents on the hallway walls. There are no limits to the possibilities of two-colour hallway design.

Paint the hallway half-height

Painting the hallway half-height is trendy and conveys a vintage style. It is also a good idea to paint the lower section darker, especially in households with children, to make marks or dirt stains less visible. In rooms where the floor contrasts with the ceiling colour, you can create a good transition.
As a rule of thumb, paint the lower third of the wall in a darker colour. Which colours and colour combinations you want to use is up to your creativity. As our wall paints can be easily painted over, you can easily change the colour scheme at any time if your taste changes over time.

You can find detailed instructions on how to do this in our blog Painting walls half-height.

Painting a hallway the right way: Instructions by MissPompadour

Paint your hallway walls yourself. We have a detailed step-by-step guide for you:

Step 1: Preparation

Thoroughly clean the walls of dust and cobwebs. Cover the floor with cardboard, newspaper or foil. Also mask off the door or window frames so that you can set the paint down cleanly. You'll also need to tape between colour shades if you're painting your hallway two-tone or half-tone. Make sure that the tape sticks well everywhere so that no paint drops can get under the tape. This way you get clean transitions.

Step 2: Apply stainblock

If you are using a stainblock such as our To Bond & Block, it is important to apply it opaquely. This may be particularly necessary when renovating a hallway if dirt and stains need to be painted over. Always make sure to use clean tools and allow the primer to dry overnight.

Step 3: Apply colour

Now you can start applying the paint. Be careful not to use too much paint on the roller or brush
It is up to you whether you use a paint roller, a brush or a paint sprayer - the application of the paint works with all three. Allow the paint to dry thoroughly before applying the second coat.

FAQ: Frequently asked questions

Material and Accessories for Painting the Hallway

• plastic drop cloth or newspaper: To protect the floor from paint splashes, you can use our plastic drop cloth.

• Adhesive tape: To protect the window and door frames, our To Mask - MissPompadour Adhesive Tape will be of great help.

• Paint roller : Our paint roller for chalk paints 18cm is particularly suitable

• Brushes: For painting large areas, choose rather wide brushes. We recommend using a bevelled brush such as our To Paint - Miss Pompadour brush so that you can also reach corners and edges easily.

• Creative stencils for wall design.