Painting radiators and metalwork

The best radiator is the one you no longer see. Painted in the wall colour, pipes included, a cast-iron or steel radiator vanishes; painted in contrast, it becomes an object. We recommend all four of our Multi-Surface paints, Dead Matt, Eggshell, Satin and Gloss, on radiators and metal once primed with our Multi-Surface Primer; Dead Matt even lets you melt radiator and wall into one flat colour.

The same method serves interior metalwork: stair balustrades, Crittall-style frames, table legs, curtain poles. The colours below are first the whites and greys that go with any wall, Pure White, Stirrup, Archway House, then the deep tones, Blackout and Downing Street, that draw a glazed screen or an iron banister.

Recommended finishes

Radiators & metal

Multi-Surface Dead Matt Multi-Surface Eggshell Multi-Surface Satin Multi-Surface Gloss

Also suitable: Metallic Paint

Primer

Multi-Surface Primer

On primed metal.

Our advice

A radiator, done well

Radiator cold, rust brushed off, primer on: three conditions for a finish that will not blister the first winter.

Multi-Surface Primer wherever you have gone back to the iron.

Prepare

Cold, clean, primed

Turn the heating off the day before: never paint a warm radiator. Dust between the sections with a brush and vacuum, wash with degreaser, rinse. Wire-brush or steel-wool any rust spots back to sound metal, then sand the old paint with 180 grit to give it a key.

On bare metal, brushed rust spots and new pipework, apply our Multi-Surface Primer; on sound old paint it is only needed where you have gone back to metal. Protect the wall behind with a sheet of card slid between radiator and wall, and the floor with a dust sheet.

Mid Wedgwood on the wall, the radiator and the pipes: it has vanished.

Paint

In the wall colour, pipes included

Apply two thin coats of Multi-Surface Dead Matt, Eggshell or Satin, 3–4 hours apart. On a column radiator, an angled radiator brush reaches behind the sections; on a steel panel, a small foam roller leaves no marks. Paint the pipes and the masked thermostatic valves in the same go, right down to the floor.

Let it dry for 24 hours before switching the heating back on, then warm it gently: a faint smell for the first few hours is normal. To melt the radiator into the room, use exactly the wall colour, Mid Wedgwood on Mid Wedgwood; to make it an object, Blackout or Iron Grey against a Pure White wall.