DH Painter & Decorator decorates hallways, stairs and landings in Kingsley, in NN2, around a mile and a half from Northampton's centre. Dean handles both the high stairwells of the late-Victorian villas facing the Racecourse and the compact halls of the terraces behind Kettering Road.
Two kinds of staircase in one district
Kingsley’s hallways fall into two quite separate groups, and the way we price and plan them differs. On the Racecourse side, the villas and high-status terraces along St George’s Avenue, East Park Parade and lower Kingsley Road date mostly from the 1870s and 1880s. Their halls are generous, ceilings are high, and the stairwell rises to a top landing well out of reach of a stepladder. Behind Kettering Road, terraces such as Junction Road have the plain Victorian layout: a narrow front hall, a steep straight flight, and a small landing serving two bedrooms.
Both are hard to decorate, for opposite reasons. In the villas the difficulty is height. In the terraces it is space, with little room to stand a ladder and every bit of cutting-in done in a confined area against the handrail and spindles.
Reaching the top landing in a Racecourse villa
We do not lean a ladder against a wall with a drop beside it. In the taller Kingsley stairwells, a stair platform or a small tower set up on the half landing gives a stable working position for the upper walls and the ceiling over the stairs. Setting up and moving that access is part of the job, so stairwells in these houses take longer than the floor area alone would suggest.
The walls themselves often need attention before any paint. Original lime plaster in these houses cracks along the stair string and around the landing, and older repairs may be patched in gypsum that reads differently under paint. We rake out and fill cracks, and where a wall is crazed rather than just cracked, a lining paper under emulsion gives a sounder surface than filler alone. Cornices in the hall are cut in by hand. The deep skirtings, the string and the long handrail are part of the same job, and the brush and finish suited to that joinery are covered on our hallway, stairs and landing decorating page.
When the hall is also the only way in
Estate agent listings for Junction Road and similar terraces give on-street parking only, and rear access through the enclosed gardens was not confirmed in the sources we checked. In practice that means ladders, dust sheets and tins all come through the front door and up the stairs you want decorated. If the hall is one of several rooms being done, we leave it until last so it is not scuffed by the rest of the work. If it is the only job, we sheet and tape the treads and keep a clear walkway so the stairs stay usable throughout.
The front door is part of most hall jobs too. On the Article 4 houses, the outside of that door falls under the 1990 direction, so we keep it in its existing colour unless the council has agreed otherwise. The inside face is yours to change.
Shared halls in let and multi-occupied houses
Kingsley ward is inside the 2012 Northampton North and Central HMO Article 4 Direction, which shows the council saw HMO conversions as an issue in this part of town. In a shared house the hall and stairs take the heaviest traffic of any room: bikes, suitcases, moving days and several people a day brushing the same walls. For those halls we suggest:
- A scrubbable or durable matt emulsion on the walls rather than a standard matt
- A mid-tone colour that hides scuffs better than brilliant white
- Satin rather than gloss on the stair spindles and handrail, which marks less under the light from the front door
- Working at times agreed with the residents so the only route in and out is never blocked
For more on Kingsley property types, see our Kingsley area page. If you are weighing up who to hire for a tall stairwell, our guide to choosing a painter and decorator sets out what to ask about access.
Last updated by Dean, DH Painter & Decorator.
