Painting Bricks and Stone....

Do Not Panic.....!

There is only One Way, Dear Readers, to get all those egg-carton gray bricks to look like "real" bricks and that is by painting them. You can imagine how eager I was to get started with this transformation! To begin with I painted them all with a coat of primer and then with a coat of ordinary latex paint in the same red as the walls of the base. I forgot to take pictures of the bricks with only the primer, and I warn you that the red painted bricks look rather alarming! I was going on the assumption that the red undercoating for the bricks would allow me to save a little on the cost of the acrylic paint used for the final color of the bricks. And once the red paint was applied, there was no turning back!

Yes, I know.... it is rather shockingly red! 

I left the "stone" portions white.... and underpainted them with a tan color 

and then a layer of gray stippled over that....

But it is very difficult to get good pictures of the colors here....

I have started to darken the bricks with a more realistic brick color.....

But it is really hard to see the difference... 

partly because the red is so bright....

and also because the "grout" spaces are still the bright red....!

I kept trying to judge the color I was painting.... 

and it kept looking wrong!

Adding more light just makes it look... More Wrong!

So I placed the Folly on the base 

so I could try to match the brick colors I had already painted on the foundation.....

And on the side wall of the garden too.... 

trying to darken the bricks....

And the sheen of the paint doesn't help either! Too much Red!!!

So I decided to work on the "stone" portions for a while....

Trying to make them look like stone....

And adding age and dirt to the places that would be dirty....

Especially at the base of the door.....

And on the steps......

I spent Hours and Hours painting.....

And darkening bricks.... 

and trying to tell if they were dark enough.....

Because before I could start with the Grout, 

I would need to seal it all with a coat of polyurethane....!

This is so that all that grout won't scrape off all the paint.....

And because I was having a hard time trying to tell if my paint was the right color....

I decided to start doing the grout on the foundation of Hardwick Hall.....

(remember that is where this all started....!)

Because one thing to remember about the grout 

is that adding it makes the color you think you have painted the bricks 

appear to be lighter than before you added the grout.....!

And then I added the grout to The Folly Foundation too...

Here the grout is still wet, so it doesn't make the color look lighter...

Only when it dries it will turn white....

So now I took my courage in my hands, Dear Readers, 

and started to add the grout to the Folly garden walls!

And I have to tell you Dear Readers, I really thought it looked horrible!

I thought the red was Much Too Red! I thought I had completely ruined my bricks!

But I decided there was nothing I could do now except keep going with the grout....

I could always add layers of darker washes of dirt later...

So I kept working on the grout. 

As it dries you have to keep sponging away the excess...

without removing too much from all the cracks.

It is a slow and messy process!

With plenty of opportunities for seeing all the places you didn't paint right.....

And comparing the parts that don't match up right.....

Here you can see where The Folly still is separate from the base....

eventually when it is attached I will have to add a little bit more grout...

(These old foundations always need some "work" after all...)

I consoled myself that eventually most of the bricks would be 

covered with garden "stuff" and dirtied corners and moss between the cracks.

And then I realized that the grout was going to look much too "new" anyway. 

It would need several layers of aging 

to bring it up to the 150 years old it is supposed to be!

At least the "stone" was all looking quite convincing to me!

And I really couldn't judge it correctly until all the grout was dry.

And once again, it was getting late....

I was just going to have to be patient, Dear Readers, 

and let it all dry before I could tell what the bricks looked like.

Of course, taking pictures in the daylight would help...

except we had an uncommonly gloomy and rainy day!

But the grout has all dried.

And the bricks and stone are painted.

And the only thing I can say, Dear Readers,

is "Don't Panic"!

It will surely look better in the morning light!