Ask the experts

Commonly asked questions

1. What can I do with my rotten decking?

This is the time of year when we get outside and see just how harsh the winter has been on our decking. Luckily, replacing decking boards is not that difficult, and you can use the time to give the whole decking area a spruce up.

Luckily, Craig Phillips has written a great guide to maintaining your decking, and it has all the information you need for replacing boards, and sprucing up and re-treating the whole area.

Best of luck, and I hope the sun carries on shining so you can out and do that work at the weekend!

2. How can I create a cosy living room?

A cream colour scheme and a wooden floor are the perfect foundations for a cosy, warm room. To inject that bit of luxury and warmth, then I think you should first invest in a rug - something with lots of texture and depth to it.

Then think about getting some throws and cushions for your sofa, and invest in some lamps. Consider elements for your room that incorporate deep, warm colours – perhaps artwork or ornaments. You could incorporate colour and cosiness with bean bags or footstools too.

And if your lampshades are warm colours, then you can change the mood of the room, making it feel even more cosy, at the touch of a switch.

You haven’t said if you have any curtains or blinds up. Rich heavy curtains add a sense of luxury to a room, and also mean you can shut out the world, making your room as cosy as possible.

With all these elements, you should be able to create the room of your dreams.

Here's a photo gallery of a cosy living room for some ideas.

3. Which wallpaper should I choose?

One misconception is that you have to sacrifice warmth for the appearance of space. While many people suggest lighter shades, a rich warm colour can hold a room together.  You can use it to enhance a focal point - a great way of making a room seem larger - by painting the wall behind the focal point (it could be fireplace or a piece of furniture) with a warm deep colour.

If you then paint the remaining walls a matching, but more neutral, tone this will accentuate the focal point, and keep the room together.

The above point taken, don’t forget working with various neutral shades does give the illusion of space, and is not to be discounted as an approach – it’s a variation of the old adage that cooler colours recede, and warmer colours advance.

When it comes to wallpaper, you can also use the right paper to accentuate a focal point by making a feature wall. Patterns can be used, just be careful to choose a paper with a vertical emphasis, to give the illusion of height.

A good tip is that when you have a paper you like, try putting it in the room for an hour or so while you're there and see how often it grabs your attention... if you glance at it continually, you'll know it's wrong. Wallpaper should be a back drop to the main story, not the headline.

Here's how to use colour to create the feel of a room.

4. How do I clean my stained patio?

Many natural stone and concrete materials can stain if they are not sealed when laid. You will need a patio stone cleaner to help, which comes as a liquid and can be diluted with water.

Apply with a hard yard brush. Scrub hard and leave to soak into the slabs, then clean away with a hard yard brush, hosing down with clean cold water from a jet water pressure until the cleaner is completely flushed away. Use the jet washer on one stone at a time, and work methodically over the whole patio.

Always read the instructions on the cleaner before use and wear safety goggles, gloves and mask.

I’d advise you seal the slabs so it won't happen again. You can paint on a clear sealant - Sika, Ronseal and Everbuild also have good products for both cleaning and sealing.

Here's a video with Jenny Powell on spring cleaning your patio.

5. How do I restore my floorboards?

Cleaning up a floor with so many problems is certainly possible for someone with little or no DIY experience, but it is hard work, and will need a lot of muscle power… not to mention a bit of courage.

If you have no practical skills whatsoever, I would suggest you find a friend who has some experience and get them to help. It is a big job for a complete novice. Some things are best left to the pros. However, if you have a friend with good practical skills, and are feeling confident, then certainly have a go.

Assuming you have some experience, or can get a friend with some experience, here’s how to go about it: the belt and braces approach to this problem is to lift and relay all of the floorboards. This sounds a bit extreme, I know, but it’s the best way.

You also have to remember that when you close all the gaps up, you may well need an extra board to fill the gap that will appear next to the wall after the last board has gone down. So make sure you have a length or two of board that will fill this gap before you start – you will need to buy some reclaimed boards anyway, to replace any boards you break when lifting the floor.

It is probable your floorboards are of the tongue and groove variety – that is, each board has one edge that has a thin deep ridge that fits into the corresponding slot in the side of the next board. This produces a very strong joint between the two pieces of timber.

Unfortunately, this means getting your first board up is tricky, and you may have to break the tongue and groove joint. Try starting off with the boards that have the largest gaps between them - this usually indicates that the tongue and groove joints are damaged anyway. Once you have the first board up and out, the rest are fairly easy.  Also, most floors have boards that have been previously lifted anyway, so start here if you can.

Always use a flat bricklaying bolster to get under each board just where the nails are holding it down, and then use a crowbar to lever up the board. This will keep damaged boards to a minimum. Most times when removing a whole floor you only damage about two or three boards and these can be replaced from most yards that sell reclaimed materials, easily found on line.

Once all boards are up, remove the nails from the boards and then you’re ready to start to refit them. A word of warning, however: keep an eye out on all cables and pipes that run under the floor. It is too easy to put a nail through an electricity cable, or a central heating or water pipe. The resulting problem can very expensive to repair. And don’t try and re-use old nails. Go and buy a job lot of new flooring nails, usually ovals or lost head nails.

Here's a video on lifting floorboards, which should be of help

6. Can I tile over existing wall tiles?

Yes, it's possible to tile on top of existing tiles – but only if the existing tiles are fixed down very well and are not loose at all. Many pros will say you should never do this but, with care, you can achieve a long-lasting result.

Trying to remove tiles from a plastered wall can become a much larger job than expected, as most tile adhesives are stronger than the plastered walls they are fixed to. So, it’s not surprising that when you try and remove the old tiles the adhesive pulls the plaster off walls or damages plasterboard.

A word of warning, however. Tiling over tiles is only realistic if you are putting up small tiles. Larger tiles, especially natural stone tiles, will be too heavy. The combined loading of the old and new tiles might cause a failure of the wall. Consult a tiler if you are not sure about this. Your tiles sound like they are quite large, so be careful with this issue.

If you are going ahead, check how well fixed the tiles are. Give them all a good tap... any that sound hollow may not be fixed well enough, and will need removing. If you have to remove any loose or broken tiles, fill in the gap with bonding plaster. Always wear gloves and safety goggles when removing any broken tiles or tile adhesive.

To begin, start by giving the existing tiles a really good clean up with wire wool and sugar soap, to remove any grime and grease. Then, get an old, flat-bladed screwdriver or wood chisel to try an rake out as much of the existing grout as possible. Finally, try to scratch the glassed ceramic surface of the tile with a very rough sandpaper.

All of these tasks will help prepare the surface for the new tile adhesive to bond to the existing tiles. This all sounds like a lot of hard work, but preparation is the key to a successful and long lasting finish.

Two final things. Firstly, make sure you get a tile adhesive that is designed for tiling on tiles, such as Bal Greenstar. And, secondly, make sure you stagger the joints, so that the new tiles' joints are not not on top of the old tiles'.

Here's a short video by Craig giving tips on tiling.

7. How do I remove Artex?

Artex must have seemed like a great idea when it was first applied to walls and ceilings. But the near impossibility of repairing it and exactly matching the original pattern, and the fact that falling against an Artexed wall is not a pleasant experience, mean it is now right out of fashion. So, how do you remove it?

First of all, here’s a word of warning about removing Artex. Older Artex, applied anytime up until the mid-1980s, contains asbestos. If you are unsure about the age of the Artex you want to tackle, then you must get specialist advice about removing it.

If you know that your Artex has been applied much more recently, then there is no reason why you can’t tackle it yourself. There are Artex softeners available on the market. You apply a paste over the Artex and leave until it has softened, before scraping it off.

Another method is to steam the Artex off. The steam softens the Artex ready for scraping away. Both of the above are messy jobs, and you have to be careful not to soften the plaster under the Artex as you go.

I’ve heard people say that they have sanded Artex off. Personally, I wouldn’t try this, it is a messy, and potentially dangerous, job that will take forever, and it is very hard to get a perfectly flat wall.

If this were my house I was talking about, then I would just plaster over the top of the Artex. Scraping off Artex, no matter how you tackle it, is a very time consuming job. Whichever way you tackle it, you are going to make a mess - so why not just get a plasterer in and do the job quickly, and finish up with perfect walls.

If you are a dab hand at plastering, and want to tackle the job yourself, just make sure you remove any high peaks in the Artex before plastering. Also, you should apply two coats of PVA adhesive over the Artex to help your plaster stick. This will also have the benefit of stopping the plaster from drying out too quickly after it is applied – Artex is very porous, and will suck moisture out of a fresh coat of plaster too quickly to allow it to be worked properly.

There is a possibility that the Artex may not be sound enough to plaster over, but this is a rare occurrence. In this case, you may have to scrape it off anyway. Or, you could go for the belt and braces approach, fixing plasterboard over the top, and then skimming the board. But this is a much more expensive job, and should be your last resort.

You can buy special products to cover up Artex, and here's a video by Polycell, explaining how it's done.

8. How do I wallpaper around a window?

If you need any help on wallpapering, you can check out an exclusive wallpapering film I recently presented for this website.

Watch: Craig Phillips: How to hang wallpaper

And here's an article all about wallpapering around obstacles

9. How can I make my small room look bigger and warmer?

With such a tiny room, you have to try and create the illusion of space. To do this a room needs to have light, and if you are going to use patterned wallpaper, make sure it has a vertical emphasis, to provide height – or avoid patterns at all.

You need to keep as much floor space clear as possible, and if there is a window in the room, do not put up curtains, but use blinds.

By keeping the windows simple, you don’t block any light, and this more minimalist approach also helps the room to feel bigger.

Also, use a big mirror on the wall… the wall opposite the room’s door is often best, as the room looks bigger before you even get into it.

If you need storage in the room, put your storage solutions high up on the wall, and use hooks and shelving to store things. (Check out IKEA for cheap and cheerful storage).

Use multi-function furniture, like a chest that’s also a coffee table, sofa beds, etc. Also use tables that fold down, or a nest of tables. Place any larger furniture against the wall, so the middle space in the room isn’t broken up, and don’t try to fit too much in the room, and keep any pieces of furniture small.

Also consider having some furniture the same colour as the wall, and try and angle some of the furniture a little to make the room feel less boxy, freeing up a little storage behind the angled piece.

The problem you have is that in trying to make the room feel warmer, you also will make it feel cosier, and a little smaller, so you need to find the right balance.
Traditional warming colours will help and other ways of warming a room are to use textures, throws and cushions, and perhaps a rug. Again, too much of this will make the room seem smaller, so go easy on this stuff.

10. How do I remove mould from bathroom tiles?

Mould in a bathroom is a direct result of moisture in the air and the condensation which results, which in turn encourages the mould to grow. You should deal with the problem promptly, as it spreads very quickly once it has taken hold.

Mould can appear in many colours, including black. To get rid of the mould, first put on some safety goggles and thick rubber gloves. Then scrub the mould away using a detergent solution and plenty of elbow grease. If you have any blackened silicone sealant that is beyond cleaning, then you may have to remove the damaged sealant and replace with a mould and mildew resistant version.
 
To prevent the problem from happening again, make sure the bathroom is well ventilated, with an extractor fan and window vents. You can also hang moisture absorbers up in your bathroom, as the fragranced pellets drink up lots of moisture, and even get rid of musty smells.

Grout can also become discoloured due to damp. Re-whiten stained grout with a product called Brilliant! Tile Grout Whitener from Lakeland. One application will bring up your grout like new, and it’s waterproof and mould resistant, too.