From walls to ceilings, think homes, hospitals, shopping centres, schools. They will always need decorating anything from a quick touch up to a major change to the existing colour scheme.
Skills needed in the Painting and Decorating Industry
Painting and decorating can be difficult, customers have high expectations, you’ll need to exceed these. If you have a steady hand, a good eye for detail and colour for those customer who would like advice and excellent people skills; after all, customers are going to be looking for quotes from several painters and decorators so standing out from an already competitive market is crucial and can also earn you recommendations. You’ll be dedicated to making a difference, creating neighbourhoods where people want to live and an organisation where people want to work.
Is Painting your passion? Why not combine it with your profession. Painting forces you to be objective. The world is a canvas to your imagination. Every wall you paint will be a blank, you will create it and give the walls meaning to the customer who has chosen a certain colour coordination for a certain reason. You’ll convert a house that someone lives in to a home that gives them a warm, content feeling.
Throughout this Apprenticeship you will have to adapt to certain situations and will learn how to deal with challenges through covering a range of techniques that will allow you to become a competent and confident painter and decorator. You will also develop your communication skills and learn about the use of drawings and specifications when on site and the processes involved in the construction of buildings. You might wonder why this is important when you’re there to paint and decorate? Understanding the construction of buildings is important as certain walls will require different paints, for example if it is an old damp building then you’d need to allow yourself more time to paint as before adding layers it would take longer for the paint to dry. You also need specific paint for certain walls and outside usage.
What will you learn?
You’ll gain knowledge in the following areas:
- Preparation of surfaces and the use of primers
- Application of paint and methods (brush, roller and spray)
- Types of paint, hanging wallpaper to a variety of surfaces
- Application of specialist finishes such as rag rolling and sponging
- Use of access equipment in painting and decorating (steps, ladders, scaffolds) not all painting will be done on the ground, you could be painting the outside of a multi-storey building, as you can imagine not even a ladder would reach that high so you’d have to use scaffolding or perhaps even a cherry picker
- Your daily responsibilities will typically involve:
- Preparing the area of work so as to not spill paint on furniture or flooring
- Measuring surface areas and working out how much paint will be needed
- Preparing materials
- Stripping down walls from previous wallpaper/sanding down paint
- Filling holes and cracks and ensuring walls are level
- Covering surfaces with primer and undercoat
- Mixing paint to the correct shade required
- Applying coats of paint, hanging wallpaper, adding special finished like glazing/marbling
- Tidying up after you’ve finished and washing brushes
- On industrial jobs you’ll also use abrasive methods like sandblasting to remove old paintwork and spray painting
- Sheffield
On average there are about 238,000 houses in Sheffield, that’s a lot of houses to paint without even getting started on businesses in that area. Albeit not all of them people will want their houses painted but Sheffield is the place to be to thrive in a painting and decorating Apprenticeship. There are a grand total of 21 painting and decorating establishments in Sheffield and you could be given the opportunity to be working in one of them.
Progression Routes
With experience you could progress to management levels, self employed, open your own business or move into related areas such as estimating, contract management, interior or set design and apprentice training. Painting and decorating is not a look, it’s a point of view. Personality will be reflected in the décor.
