ive always steered away from paints like f&b,little green,fired earth etc as i thought they were over priced poncy rubbish.
i was asked to supply fired earth emulsion on a job the other week and was very pleasantly surprised.
i gave the walls two coats as a matter of course but would have easily got away with one,the opacity i.m.o was miles better than dulux.there was a lot more pigment than normal and on one area i had to touch up later there was no flashing at all.
i opened an account with them and got a 20% discount making it about about a fiver dearer than dulux v/matt.
not something i would use everyday cause of the price but have to admit it wasnt bad at all.
anyone else use this company?

I have only used fired earth paints the once about 4yr ago as jonnos could not mix up the colour close enough. I seem to remember it was not to bad for a posh paint seemed better than cannon & ball anyways

Stay away from it myself, personally I think F&B is more hassle than it's worth.
However I'm tempted to try this fired earth if it's as good as you say it is.

Farrow & Ball make very good paint IMO. The Modern Emulsion is as good as anything currently available, covers well and goes on lovely. Estate Emulsion is a quirky paint, but if used with F&B primer/undercoat (which it really needs) then it will be OK. It's not keen of being touched up, but if everyone's careful around it when dry, there will be no issues. I find it a real 'one wall at a time paint. And the chalky look is really nice too.

Not an everyday choice on account of the price, but on the occasions it can be justified, it's well worth the effort.

Estate Eggshell - Well now!! The best acrylic (OK hybrid) trim paint on the market. It covers beautifully, applies like an alkyd and takes Floetrol better than most. With through prep, and good synthetics, nothing else even comes close. I wish more manufacturers would make paint like Estate Eggshell.

F&B emulsion has never caused me any problems. Sanderson is excellent. The prices of these paints are a little more than Dulux, but on a £ 500 room, £ 20 is nothing really. I always pass it on to the customer anyway and they never mind. Poeple who care that much about £20 usually do their own decorating.

Not keen on the estate emulsion as a few of the colours do flash on touching up, and the vinyl matt by Jonnos for example has a lower sheen level at the moment. It also marks up pretty easily. The Modern emulsion is really nice though - surprisingly tough.

Little Greene emulsion is excellent, around 3 liters covered a 5 meter square room up to the picture rail at about 2.30m.

I recommend Little Greene Intelligent emulsion and Mythic flat for kitchens - they are both scrubbable and flat. LG have two colour cards - the one for off whites is very good, the other not so good as the FB.

I did use the Fired earth a few years ago - a clay based paint I think - it dripped in sheets , they might have changed it I guess.

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One of the advantages of these designer paints is that the colour cards are limited to (132 F&B) and (Little Greene 200.) this makes it much easier for the customer to make a decision compared to the 15000 odd colours the major suppliers offer. The marketing of designers paints also makes the customer feel they have made the right decision, especially with period colours because they are "appropriate " and therefore correct.

I must admit I avoided f&b for years chalking it up(forgive the pun) to the durability and it being a poncy posh paint for tof's and housewives wanting to brag to their mates!

But since i've moved my main work from regular 'homes' to more elaborate county house type homes, I can't get enough of it! I can charge the retail price and a premium for my labour, I Can take a little extra time to make it perfect and get to see some fantastic properties.

WIN WIN

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A local shopkeeper i know recently stated stocking Fired earth and Little Greene paint and as I know her she has reccomended me to her customers if they enqiure about Decorators so I have used these paints quite often over the past 8 months or so. I have found them every bit as good as other paints and a lot better in some cases the coverage and finish exceptional .As mentioned previousley the F&B estate eggshell is as good and better than most I realise these paints are more expensive but if marketed properly I think more customers would use them ,ive never been a big fan of getting these paints mixed into other brands my supplier says they can match F&B colours he showed me a sample which was not an exact match and certainly the dead flat finish was not there in my opinion at the end of the day its horses for courses .

Only the other day did someone ask me what the score was with 'ponce paints'...I recently used Fired Earth, F&B and Laura Ashely paints virtually side by side and I must admit fired earth came in the best of the lot..paintability, opacity finish where all excellent..

Laura Ashely was pretty good too..albeit a little soft, chalky and delicate..

The biggest crock of sh*t was F&B (estate emulsion) ...rubbish opacity, the finish had a far higher sheen than Dulux vinyl matt (which I used to top up some filler prior to doing a finish coat..) and you only have to look at it the wrong way and it marks..and burnishing was diabolical...VERY overpriced for what it is...but they are very good at marketing their paints..(ex B&Q man is their marketing manager I beleive) they group the colours very cleverly on a fancy colour card with some ye olde English font and the gullible Wally's and snobs in middle England who think they are getting something really special are there, buying it by the bucket load!

My customer was gutted, especially when F&B said that estate emulsion should not be used on high traffic areas (even though it doesnt say so on the tin)...and now has to pay me to give the whole lot a couple of coats of matt glaze/varnish

I wouldnt brand all 'ponce paints' with the same brush...I have only heard good things about Little Green and Annie Sloane...and cost is fast becoming irrelevant given the high prices Dulux and Crow trade are now charging...

But I dont think some people need to look a little deeper when choosing brands of paint purely because of the name.

Colour wise they think the these paints are unique..think about the situation where a customer wont have magnolia because its 'common' and then goes for a colour on a fan deck that is almost identical.. ...im sure if your poured Dulux natural calico into a F&B tin and planted the seed in the customers mind by saying, 'oh you can tell the difference between F&B colours which is what makes them special'...they would agree.

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