Stucco: Remove It or Plaster Over It??
We’re about to come into possession of a limestone near the park in which most of the interior walls have old stucco finishes. Although my mother in law tells me that this means we’ll never see cracks, I don’t really like the surfaces. Any thoughts about how to make smoother walls? Can you just skim…
We’re about to come into possession of a limestone near the park in which most of the interior walls have old stucco finishes. Although my mother in law tells me that this means we’ll never see cracks, I don’t really like the surfaces. Any thoughts about how to make smoother walls? Can you just skim coat over it all to make flat walls? Or do you have to scrape it all away?
Thanks!
I am all for green building material but the reality is that not everyone can afford to build green. So you have to choose what is important. Putting cloth insulation in the walls has much more to do with protecting your contractor who is the one who will be exposed to all the floating fibers while installing the stuff. Once the insulation is in the walls you and your kids are never exposed to the stuff. All I am trying to offer is accurate information.
1/2″ sound board (homosote) behind 1/2″ or 5/8″ sheetrock provides a pretty good sound barrier for interior residential work.
The demand for green building materials is huge and it is a huge growth area in construction businesses. Homeowners want this stuff. If you are a contractor and are very resistant to getting knowledgeable about green building, you’re leaving yourself behind. It’s not just eco concerns. Parents are worried about autism, allergies and other health issues with toxic building materials.
Oh, please! Most people are not looking for natural cloth insulation. It is a luxury that is far from necessary. The fact is that once the insulation is in the wall you have no exposure to that material. Fiberglass insulation that would go in the wall is about 30 cents per sq. ft., which is pretty damn cheap, very effective and has advantages over cloth insulation e.g. it does not burn, and will not become soaked by a water leak. And cloth insulation is still less than a dollar a sq. ft.. There is no such thing as cork insulation placed behind the wall. Please stop trying to convince people to save their plaster when it makes no sense and you really don’t seem to know that much about it. There are times when it does make sense to keep the plaster walls intact, but please give the home owner the correct information to make that decision.
Any soundproofing materials I’ve seen are quite expensive.
Especially if you are looking at natural nontoxic materials like most people want. Cloth insulation is one of the best for example, and it’s expensive. Cork is expensive.
If you put good insulation behind the sheetrock, which is not expensive and easy to do, it in fact has better sound absorbing qualities than plaster.
Sheetrock offers almost no sound-absorbing properties, keep that in mind. Plaster absorbs or blocks sound much better. You may not like the texture of the stucco but you’ll be happier keeping it and not hearing all the sounds throughout your house and from the neighbors too.
Remember form follows function. Don’t sacrifice solid, quality walls just for aesthetics. Lots of 20’s houses in Los Angeles had those kinds of walls, including mine. You can make it work. I know people would sand it down a little bit. It wouldn’t be perfectly smooth but it would be more subtle. And then rich colors make the bumps disappear visually. The bumps show more on pale walls.
I’ve done lots of this. Yes, you can skimcoat, however that’s a really big job if much of your house is stucco. I’m all for saving original plaster but if you have to cover that much surface I would consider taking out the stucco & plaster and going with sheetrock. Be sure to save any plaster details you can.