Pre-1970 homes, render, heritage and conservation areas are where painting gets specialist. Lead paint needs testing and containment; render needs a different system; heritage needs council approval. The edge cases worth a second opinion before you sign.
Most repaints are straightforward. A handful aren’t, and they’re the ones where the wrong painter can make things genuinely worse. Pre-1970 homes, render, heritage and conservation areas, and metal surfaces all need a specialist system and, sometimes, specialist permission. These are the edge cases worth a second opinion before you sign.
Pre-1970 buildings (lead paint)
Lead paint needs a test, sealed-off work, and the right safety gear and waste handling. Dry sanding it is truly dangerous. A lead-safe method is a must, not an option.
Render or stucco surfaces
Different primer, different paint system. A painter who puts ordinary house paint on render gets about a year before it crazes.
Heritage / conservation area
Council pre-approval on exterior colours, and original-material matching for original finishes. Specialist work, the wrong painter makes it worse, not better.
Steel / metal surfaces
Rust treatment, etch primer, specific topcoats. The wrong system rusts through the new paint inside 18 months.
Dark-to-light colour change
Needs at least three coats, sometimes a tinted primer. A two-coat job won’t cover. Ask about coats explicitly.
Mould-prone surfaces
Bathrooms, laundries and north-facing inland walls need anti-microbial primer and a mould-resistant topcoat. Often skipped in cheap quotes.
If your home predates 1970, assume lead is in the older layers until a test says otherwise. Dry-sanding it releases dust that’s hazardous to everyone in the house, which is why lead-safe prep (containment, correct PPE, proper disposal) is a real, costed step, not a line to skip. A quote that treats a heritage repaint exactly like a new-build repaint hasn’t understood the job.
On a heritage or lead-paint home, the cheap quote isn’t just a worse finish, it can be a health risk and a council problem. This is the job to price honestly.
Ask this, exactly
“My home is pre-1970, render, or in a heritage area. Have you done this exact kind of work? How do you handle lead-safe prep? Can I see photos of a similar job?”
A specialist talks comfortably about testing, containment and the correct system. Vagueness here is a reason to get a second opinion before you commit.
Brushline handles lead-safe prep on pre-1970 homes, heritage colour matching and conservation-area work, and the correct render and metal systems. We price these as the specialist jobs they are and show you references before you commit, because on these homes, honesty about scope is the whole point.
Brushline Painting Co.