Serendipity

A happy accident...  


You see, I had this box of filler that I bought the other day, and I needed to do some plastering so, as the shops are shut on Sunday, I thought I'd just use up the box of filler first.


I went about it scientifically.  I looked up plastering on the Internet and read a few bits; I actually read the instructions on the box.  I got a large bowl and half-filled it with cold water and shook in the filler powder, mixing with a stick as I went, to avoid lumps.  Half-way through, I noticed that, lower down on the box it said...





...and I, of course, had put in about twice as much water as that and it wasn't even a full box of filler!!


So - what to do?  It seemed pointless to throw away the whole lot, bit I doubted that, even in the hot sun outside, evaporation would cause enough water loss for me to have a decent plaster mix left.


Then I had the idea of brushing it on the wall, like a wash.  It was a thin cream consistency, so I thought that the bricks and bare plaster would suck out the water pretty quickly and at least give me a surface that the next layer of plaster would stick to.  This is exactly what happened and, in fact, the wash dried out very quickly and I was able to brush on 2 or 3 coats in some places.


It was messy, but when I stood back and looked at the effect, I thought it was almost mediaeval-like.  In fact, I like it so much I am considering just brushing on a few more coats to give a more even surface and then just painting it!





Above the doorway there are some bricks missing, so I shall have to put some new ones in, but I think that, even on bare brick and the ends of beams, the effect is charmingly rustic and will look even better painted.  Look at the pictures below...






What do you think?