How to Make Over a Dining Room

Ron visits historic St. Augustine, Florida to help Ed and Jessie Gail Atkins with a dining room makeover, complete with paint, a new floor and new furniture.

Click here to view a full video of this segment.

Click Here For a list of what you will need in order to complete this project.

Paint

1. Color selection
It is often difficult to visualize what a room will look like, especially when you are dealing with unfamiliar or bold colors. For help with this, Ron found a virtual paint website that offered several different "virtual rooms" that you can paint any color or combination of colors you would like, including accents and trim.

2. Wall preparation
An important first step in any paint job is to clean the walls thoroughly with warm water and detergent.

Before applying primer, repair any holes or cracks in the walls. First remove all the excess paint from around the holes or cracks so that the surrounding surface is smooth and then fill the holes and cracks with spackle and allow it to dry. Sand the surface to a smooth finish.

See Ron's tip on using a 5-in-1 Tool.

3. Primer
When filling your brush with paint, don't drag it over the rim as you take it out of the can. This removes all the paint from the bristles leaving a brush that is too dry. Instead, dip the brush into the paint and then gently slap it on the inside of the can to remove the excess paint while leaving a fully loaded brush.

Begin by applying primer to the corners, the edges around the door and window casings, and the upper edge of the wall where the wall meets the ceiling.

If the baseboards are to be painted, they also need to be primed. The chair rail molding also needs to be primed.

Pour the paint in a five-gallon bucket and then hang a roller screen on the inside. You can put enough paint in a bucket to nearly paint an entire room and you can load the roller a lot better with the screen.

Move the bucket to always keep it near you. This helps to save steps when reloading the roller and avoids dripping excess paint on the floor.

Using a paint roller on a pole, roll the primer onto the entire wall in long strokes from top to bottom.

4. Chair rail location
The chair rail will separate the two colors of paint. Originally it was designed to keep the back of the chair from damaging the wall so it should be positioned at the height of the chair back.

Measure the height of the chair and then transfer that mark to the wall. Add about a half an inch so that the top of the chair rail is just above the chair back.

If a new floor is going to be put in, add the thickness of the floor to the measurement.

The break between the two colors of paint should run though the center of the rail. Make a mark on the wall where you would like to break the two colors. Extend this mark across the wall using a laser level.

Mark along the laser line about every twelve inches. The laser level is designed to continue around the corner. Repeat the process until all four walls are marked with paint break lines.

5. Paint wall
Begin by applying the top color. Strike a paint line where the laser line is drawn. The paint break doesn't have to be perfect because it will be concealed behind the chair rail.

Use a brush to paint the edges and corners first, and then cover the rest of the wall using rollers. After loading the roller, paint one solid stroke from up near the ceiling all the way down to the cut line. Then go back up and down over the same area.

When the roller is no longer full, load it again, and paint another strip leaving an unpainted strip about one roller width in between. After unloading the second roller, load it a third time and fill in the unpainted strip by rolling from one over to the other. This technique helps put an even coat of paint on the wall.

After the top section of the wall is painted, go back and paint the bottom section.

6. Paint trim
Use masking tape to protect the freshly painted wall and the floor. Apply paint to the baseboards using the accent color. After finishing the baseboards, move outside to paint the chair rail, which was primed earlier. Painting the chair rail before it is attached to the wall saves the trouble of having to mask the wall later on.

Laminate floor

1. Select flooring
Laminate looks just like wood, but wears extremely well and never requires finishing.

Ron selected a floor from Armstrong that is a floating system, which means that the new floor is not attached to the old floor underneath.

The laminate planks rest on strips of foam underlayment, which act as a moisture barrier and cushion. The strips of underlayment are connected with clear packaging tape.

2. Install flooring
Once the floor is installed, it will expand and contract. Use spacers to create a quarter of an inch gap all the way around the outside edge so that the floor has room to expand.

Each laminate plank has interlocking joints on the ends and on the sides, which eliminate the need for adhesive. When you reach the end of a row, simply measure the distance from the end of the last plank to the wall and cut the last plank to size with a circular saw.

After installing the final plank in the first row, begin the second row using the cut piece from the first row. This will help to stagger the joints.

When installing the second row, interlock the side joints together first. To close the end gap, use a tool called a tapping block. The slot in the tapping block slips over that tongue of the plank. Use a hammer to gently drive the plank down to close the end joint.

At the end of the row, the tapping block won't fit, so you will need to switch to another similar tool called a pull bar. Instead of tapping from the end, you pull it towards you from the opposite direction and tap with the hammer.

3. Door casings
Where there is a door casing, you will need to cut away a small strip off the bottom of the casing to allow the floor to slide underneath.

Stack a piece of flooring on top of a piece of underlayment to create a depth guide, and then use an undercut saw to cut away the casing.

Draw the approximate shape of the door casing onto the end of the plank and then use a jigsaw to cut the shape out.

Interlock the side of the plank into place and then slowly drive it beneath the casing by striking the opposite end of the row using the tapping block.

4. Finishing trim
Apply construction adhesive to a T-shaped transition-molding strip designed to cover the joint between the two different floors.