Painting wicker furniture advice is needed...?

Question

We have natural looking wicker furniture that we want to paint black. Need advice.

Do we need to prime it first?

Should we use oil or latex based?

Should we use any kind of cleaner/varnish remover b-4 we paint?

My husband seems to think we need to first use a remover to get old varnish off but it's so weathered that I know that it will be easy to paint, and he thinks we need oil based paint. I am trying to explain to him that oil based is a nightmare and that we really don't even need to prime since it's natural and we are taking it to black. I'm surprised of his lack of knowledge about painting b/c the REASON for priming is to make sure that your have true color. Painting over red with primer enables a "clean slate" per sey, but paintin gover natural with black is sort of like a clean slate.

Anyway, this is turnign into a nighmare. I almost just want to sell the wicker furniture on ebay and buy NEW. This project could end up costing us our marrige (ha-ha).

Help

Answer 1

OK you would prime it to yes start with a clean slate, and you don't necessarily have to. Here is a fool proof method. Use a spray gun and spray paint the primer kilz on it. You can purchase it at home depot, or Lowe's. I would then spray paint it using "rustoleum" it's a brand of spray paint, that is thicker paint, and won't rust or weather. It's great for outdoor pieces! I recommend this to my clients. You don't have to listen to my advice above, but whatever you do, DO NOT USE OIL BASE PAINT! It will not adhere to the wicker and just ruin the furniture so bad that in the end the garbage men won't want to take it!