My guest bedroom has needed some work for a while!!  The wall color has been screaming at me to paint over it for a few years now, but I had just never gotten around to it making it happen.  A few weeks ago I was at Menard’s and I used the Pittsburgh Paint and Stain Digital Inspiration Studio to FINALLY start on this project.  (Find out How to Choose the Perfect Paint Color, HERE.)  I don’t know what took me so long.

Here’s the room before I started…

I really wanted to give the wall behind the bed some texture.  I walked the aisles of the hardware store for some inspiration and came up with a few options, but ultimately decided on a faux brick.  My biggest fear with the “faux” part of this project, is that….well, it would look faux.  I’ve wanted to add brick to an area of my house for a while now and this seemed like the perfect space to give it a try.

I will say, I’m so happy at how it turned out and honestly you can’t tell it’s not real deal. 😉

In my opinion, the cuts are the most important part of this project.  When I cut the panels I made sure all the cuts were on grout lines.  You can see from the picture below how I notched out the bricks and the the full sheet is cut straight on one of the lines.  I used a multi-purpose tool for the cut-outs but you can also use a jigsaw.  Don’t worry about the imperfections they will get fixed later.

Once the boards were cut, but before they went on the wall, I added some mortar.  I started by using pre-mixed mortar on the grout lines of the brick panel.  I just used my fingers so it was uneven and looked intentional. (This was a super quick process, but will ultimately depend on how big of an area you are doing.)

I also painted the bricks with a white sample paint from Pittsburgh Paints.  I only needed a very small amount of paint for this step of the process.  I used a brush with a small amount of paint then wiped most of it off with a rag.  Real brick soaks up paint so I wanted it to look as real as possible.

Then I hung all the panels on the wall and filled in the seams with the pre-mixed mortar.

You can see the before and after in the next picture.  You literally can not tell where the seams are!

Once the brick wall was finished, I tackled the rest of the room.  I had used the Digital Inspiration Studio to help pick the color.

I decided to go with Pittsburgh Paints and Stains, Swirling Smoke, from their Grand Distinction® Paint and Primer in One line.  This paint provides outstanding coverage, stain and scrub resistance, and washability.   The Swirling Smoke is in the gray color family but has a little bit of a brown undertone.

It turned out beautiful!

I ended up adding some molding to transition between the brick and the drywall.

I love how it turned out!

Check out the full makeover HERE.