My Two Best Recommendations for Removing Old Paint

When I got back from my Cross Country Trip, I quickly got to work on my next project at My 1914 Bungalow which was removing old paint from my bathroom vanity. I’m planning to refresh the entire space but wanted to get the hardest part out of the way first. Several months ago, I removed the paint from the cabinet doors and now I am working on the cabinet base and top. Since I’ve done a lot of paint removal over the years, I wanted to share with you my two best recommendations for removing old paint.

Klean Strip Premium Stripper

A furniture flipper I follow on Instagram shared this particular stripper and she swears by it. So, I decided to give it a try when I was working on a chest of drawers. My past experience with paint strippers has never been very positive. It would always either be too thin consistency wise or just not work. Or perhaps it was a user error.

I’m happy to say that is not the case with this paint stripper. It goes on pretty thick and within ten minutes pulls the paint loose and is ready to be scraped off. Typically speaking it takes a few coats if there are several layers of paint but it works far superior to any other product I’ve tried.

I use a steel bowl to pour the stripper into and spread on with a brush. After waiting approximately ten minutes, I start scraping it off and discard of the old paint. For small detailed areas try using a small wire brush to get into the grooves.

Heat Gun

For a few years now, my team and I have been using a heat gun for paint removal in the historic homes we work on. Until then, I had a pretty big fear that heat guns were too dangerous and could catch things on fire. However, I quickly got over that fear after giving it a try. This heat gun is incredibly affordable and has several attachments you can use.

Safety wise I would recommend making sure any of the hot residue is not burning before discarding and there are a lot of fumes, so be sure to wear a mask. I like to use a five-in-one tool along with a contour scraper, especially for trim with curves like picture railing to scrape off the paint as it is heated. We have used the heat gun on old trim such as picture railing, baseboards, doors, windows, and trim and it works great on all of them. One word of caution – the heat will break glass so be extra careful when working on window sashes.

Next year I plan to strip most of my house’s trim and all of the window sashes. Since most of the paint is peeling, this task has moved up the priority list. I will let you know which of the two methods works best.