Retro Basement Floor say "Hello" to This... {Painting our Linoleum Floor}

We decided to paint our very dated linoleum floor in the basement. I won't miss you at all somewhat distressed green, yellow, and black floor tiles.

Our basement is home to our TV room and children's playroom. It's a well-used room and we were never in a rush to spiff it up for several reasons.

a. The expense. We would rather spend our home dollars on other upstairs updates.
b. We didn't sweat our kids going a little wild down there because it's an old basement and preferred to keep it this way.

But it got to a point where it was time for a change. We considered a variety of alternatives including carpet and large plush area rugs; however, we couldn't find anything we really liked. But we hadn't considered painting the floors until recently and were amazed by tutorials like this and this. Of course, I love the idea of working with what you've got and how affordable it is. While I liked the idea of a stenciling the floor we decided to simplify and go with your basic two-tone stripes.

Clearing out just one half of the basement at a time (we started in the back corner), we cleaned up the floor first by vacuuming and then mopped.

We let the floor dry and then applied this primer which is ideal for a glossy surface like linoleum. We picked it up at our local Home Hardware.

It was strong smelling stuff. So we had all the basement windows open and a fan going to keep the air moving.

The primer went on well and since we don't have baseboards just yet there was no cutting in involved.

Next up, we were recommended this Porch & Patio Floor Paint tinted to the color(s) we wanted. For the stripes we went with Bleached Linen (which is the wall color) and Silver Drop (which we used in our son's bedroom and really liked).

So far, we've applied the Bleached Linen and we're waiting for the first coat to dry.

We decided to do stripes that are two linoleum square tiles wide which has been an awesome guide. As far as taping out the lines, we'll do that when we apply the grey stripes, since we don't mind our white stripes being roughed in and then slightly painted over with a darker color.

It looks a lot brighter and fresher, doesn't it? We are really happy with it.

Let's just appreciate a few before shots for the moment.

(We plan to paint the stairwell while we're at it).

And our progress.

It's a HUGE difference to us.

We'll be sure to post photos of the finished product when it's all done.


Anyone else freshening up their dated linoleum floors?