PaintCasein
Peinture à la caséine
The old distemper — a milk paint, velvety and deeply matt, and strictly for dry rooms.
A panel of Klimt’s Beethoven Frieze at the Vienna Secession, painted in casein on plaster: matte, with a depth a film does not have.
Photo Gustav Klimt · Public domain · Wikimedia Commons
At a glance
- Water
- Keep it dry
- Outside
- Indoors
- Floor
- Walls only
- Upkeep
- Periodic
- Vapour
- Vapour-open
What it is made of
Casein (milk protein, or drained curd), air lime to set it, water, pigments.
Application
The support
An absorbent, dry ground: plaster, render, bare wood. Dust it; on a very porous ground a thinned casein coat acts as primer.
Tools
Wide brush or roller, whisk, sieve.
Steps
- 1Mix the powder into cold water and let it swell, then add the pigments.
- 2Strain it: a lump makes a blotch.
- 3Two thin coats, the second once the first is touch-dry.
- 4Use the mix within the day: it is a binder that goes off.
Drying
A few hours between coats; the paint hardens over one to two weeks.
The trade’s general sequence, at about 20 °C. Where a producer publishes its own data sheet, that sheet wins.
Price
One product, from a single producer
Cheapest pot
8.10 €
125 mL
Per kilo, from
not published
Per litre, from
21.33 €
Per m², from
not published
| Product | From | €/kg · €/L | €/m² |
|---|---|---|---|
| Velours de PeintureLibéron | 8.10 € | 21.33 €/L | — |
Material prices incl. VAT as published by this catalogue’s producers, samples excluded. Labour is never included, and a price per m² only exists where the producer publishes a coverage.
Upkeep
It does not wash; it fears standing damp and grease, but it touches up invisibly.
- Demands · Periodic
- Vapour-open