How to crackle Finish

Question

I want to crackle a bedroom. I'm thinking of a red base crackled through a dark gray or a black base crackled through a light gray. Also how do you crackle? I was reading up on how to do it and it seems easy but still a little confussed.

Answer 1

There area couple of methods.  The first, you paint your base coat, apply the crackle medium either let it dry or get tacky (depends on the medium) then paint over the topcoat and it will crackle as the medium reacts with it.  I prefer this technique.  The second you paint the base coat, apply the second coat then apply the medium to crackle the last coat.  I have not had very good results using this method.  With the first method, you can actually control the size of the crackle cracks by how thick you apply the top coat over the medium.  Thicker makes for larger cracks, thinner makes more spider webby smaller cracks. The only glitch with this method is that you CANNOT go over an area twice with the top coat and you can only apply it in one direction for the crackle medium to work.  But, when you paint the medium on the topcoat, you have no control no matter how thick or thin you applied the coat you want crackled.  In addition, when you apply the crackle on the top, it leaves a residue and you cannot put any sort of sealer over it because it won't adhere properly.  Further, most of the time I have used the second method, the crackle I do get is so inconsistent that in areas it doesn't have enough webbing and you cannot do anything about it.