Tag: home office

Image of home office accent wall primed with KILZ Restoration and painted with BEHR Caribe PPU13-01.

Inspiration

A Home Office Designed for Focus and Productivity

April 12, 2022

Working from home requires your full attention and focus, but with so many things around the house competing for your attention, it may feel impossible to tackle even the smallest items on your to-do list. Feeling overwhelmed may even be the reason you’ve put off designing a functional home office, but there’s no time like the present to get to work.

Your home office should be a dedicated workspace where you can distance yourself from distraction, confidently attend those virtual meetings, and really be productive. We hope this room makeover motivates you to finally get started creating a practical space in your home where you can go when you need to get things done.

Whether you’re renovating an old office or creating a space from scratch, it’s important to form a vision from the start. Our goal was to transform an outdated office from dark and stuffy to modern, bright, and airy, and because we knew we wanted fresh paint to help accomplish this, our first step was to find the best primer for the job. We chose KILZ Restoration^® Interior Primer for a few reasons. Because we wanted to refresh a built-in shelving unit, as well as walls, we chose a multi-surface primer formulated for use on wood, drywall, plaster, brick and more. Since some older rooms can have their share of imperfections, we also love that this primer conceals tough stains and odors like a charm.

Before getting started, we prepped the room by cleaning all the surfaces we planned to prime. This is an important step, as smooth and clean surfaces ensure a perfect primer application and even better coat of paint. Sometimes old surfaces need quick sanding or scrub down, so if this applies to you, make sure everything is clean and dry before you begin priming. For rooms that may have suffered damage (smoke, fire, water, mold), you’ll need to address these problems beforehand, however, KILZ Restoration^® Interior Primer is ideal for jobs of this kind thanks to its odor and stain blocking formula and thick consistency, which is great for filling in small cracks and splitting.

Because of the nature of the shelving unit in our home office, we chose to prime using both a brush for all those nooks and crannies and a roller for larger surface areas, like the walls. Once we evenly applied primer to all our surfaces, we let it dry—which can take anywhere from 30 minutes to 3 hours, depending on the number of coats used and humidity in the room—and then prepared to paint. We wanted to create a statement with color, which is why we chose BEHR^® Caribe PPU13-01 for the shelves, and BEHR^® Ultra Pure White for the walls. This paint combo makes the walls appear brighter in contrast with the vibrant teal shelves, creating a sophisticated-casual vibe that is clean and current, and primed for productivity.

There’s already great light in this room thanks to its extra-large window, but our fresh white walls reflect the sunlight and considerably helped to brighten up the room. We chose a modern, asymmetrical desk to replace the more substantial, yet outdated one, and we added a light gray rug underneath to further cheer up the space. Other inspired, minimalist touches are seen in the standing lamp and shelving décor. This clean, contemporary vibe creates an atmosphere where you are free to focus for hours on end.

We’re so pleased with how this room came together, and how beautifully our paint came to life on two different surfaces. Achieving these clean and vibrant colors with a smooth matte finish would have been a much larger task had we not made the effort to prime first. Keep this in mind the next time you’re ready to tackle a room makeover, so that your DIY project turns out just as skilled as the pros and gets you excited for the next one.

Always remember to refer to our website kilz.com or product back labels for additional information on which primer is right for your project and detailed instructions on how to apply our products. Check out our Coverage Calculator to understand your estimated paint needs for your upcoming project.

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Inspiration

WFH Spaces that Inspire Great Work

February 12, 2021

In the last year our homes have become more multi-functional than ever, becoming the spaces many people work and even go to school. Creating a space that can serve as an office or study area can be a challenge – especially if you don’t have an extra room just sitting empty and waiting for a makeover. But with a little creativity and the power of primer, you can create a gorgeous WFH (or study at home) area in just about any size space. Read on to see how we took two drab, uninspiring spaces and transformed them into attractive, design-forward offices and study areas that would motivate anyone to do their best work.

The key to our success? A layer of KILZ® Primer and a coat of fresh paint — once again proving that hard-working primer and quality paint are cost-effective tools in any type of interior makeover. Along the way, we added on-trend and functional furniture and a few eye-catching accessories. Here’s exactly what we did, and how we achieved these much-needed transformations.

From a Neglected Nook to a Happy Home Office

For our first transformation, a peaceful office was converted from an unused corner in a larger room. Given the limited dimensions, the space called for colors that would visually enlarge the area. Our first job was to open it up so you could feel like you’re working in a pleasant room, not a closet. Toward that end, we opted for light, airy shades that would add a subtle touch of color, while opening up the room to make it feel less confining. We also resorted to a tried-and-true designer’s trick—installing wall-to-wall shelving to create a space-saving recessed work area.