Hello to everyone! I am Pasquale Semeraro, the owner of Resina Color situated in Putignano (BA) Italy
Very often, I am in front of this question:
“ I have to paint white my home, which product I have to use? A washable tempera or a quartz paint?”
Today, I would like to explain the difference that exists between a washable paint, a breathable paint and a quartz paint.
I try to be less technical as possible, to be able to explain the substantial differences, to those people who don’t know the existing differences even.
I will do this very briefly this time, and without going into detail, because I would like to give a well – specific article to each type of paint.
First of all, it is necessary to understand what kind of surface we want to paint, because, according to the support, we recommend you the best product to use. So it is very important to explain this particular to your dealer or trustworthy layer.
We all manufacturers of paints and varnishes have created a wide range of products we can summarize and contain in two categories:
- Paints for inner rooms ( washable, semi – washable, breathable, tempera, decorative, and so on)
- Paints for outside rooms (among them, the most widespread is the quartz paint).
All products of these categories can be produced with resins that may be acrylic, vinyl, styrene – acrylic.
Now we examine this in detail and we try to understand what is the difference between these products.
WASHABLE PAINT
A washable paint, that is based on acrylic, vinyl or styrene resins, is usually indicated for the application to the external and the interior walls of the house.
Washable paints are formulated with a percentage of resins in such a way as to, once applied on the wall and dried in depth, resist to the abrasion and to the chemical agents such as detergents or other.
In addition, the use of very thin charges as calcium carbonate, talcs, kaolins, gives the product an aesthetic final effect that is very pleasant to the touch and to the view.
BREATHABLE PAINTS
A breathable paint, that is based on acrylic, vinyl or styrene resins, is indicated for the application on ceilings or in all those environments not very ventilated, precisely because it allows, as the name implies, the breathability.
Breathable paints are formulated with a percentage of resin less than a washable paint; so this allows, when the product is dry in depth, to “breathe” the wall, and to breathe in ad to breathe out the water vapour that has emerged in environments.
QUARTZ PAINTS
The quartz paints, that are based on vinyl, acrylic or styrene resins, are usually indicated for an external application, because a quartz powder, a hard charge, is added in them; this allows the paint applied, once dried in depth, to resist to chemical and atmospheric agents.
I am sure that your trustworthy dealer or clever applicator will recommend you the right product and also explain the various differences that I have briefly explained to you, but I intend to go into detail in the next articles.


