Crazy Technique for Clean Paint Lines (no bleeding)

I learned this technique to get nice clean lines when you are painting with different colors during my staircase remodel. If interested, you can view that project here.  I was painting the stair treads a dark brown and the trim around the stairs was a bright white. I had painted a few of the areas where the tread met the stair by using the traditional strip of painters tape but found that some of the other color was bleeding through and I wasn’t getting the clean line that I wanted until I used the following technique.  

Step 1 – Apply the first color but don’t pay close attention to painting over the line. In my example, I painted the stair tread dark brown first and painted a little over and beyond the edge.  

Step 2 – One the paint is dry tape over the paint at the area where you want the color separation and clean line. In my example I taped on top of the stair tread at the very edge of the step where it met the trim wall.  

Step 3 – Now take a brush and paint a layer over and slightly above the tape with the same color that you already used. In this case it was dark brown. I know this may not make sense because now I’m painting some brown on the white area and it looks messy but this will all make sense shortly.  

Step 4 – I let the brown paint that I applied over the tape dry. This serves as a barrier now that is has dried and anything that may have bled through is the same color as what is underneath.  

Step 5 – Now apply the other color (in this case white) at the tape line. Apply more than one coat if needed.  

Step 6 – Remove the tape before the white paint dries completely and behold the straight clean line!  

You can use this technique when painting lines on walls or baseboards and in other ways.  

Happy Painting!