Spilt Paint On My Patio

I’ve Spilt Paint On My Patio Slabs. What Will I Do?

Introduction

“Oh dear! The spilt paint on my patio slabs created a 20cm dia. puddle when my tin of mahogany paint blew over. It was tipped up by a gust of wind which lifted the cardboard it was resting on.”

“There would have been photos but I had to swear first and then get on with cleaning it up.” — HC

How I Cleaned Up The Spilt Paint On My Patio

I began the clean-up process of removing the spilt paint on my patio without delay, before the paint puddle spread out or started to set.

This is how I dealt with it:

  1. I went and got a roll of paper towels (a kitchen roll) and ripped off two sheets still joined together and folded them to double the thickness,
  2. then with both hands I scooped the paint towards the middle of the puddle from the far side,
  3. I left the paper towels in the puddle to soak it up,
  4. with more paper towels I scooped the paint towards the middle of the puddle from the near side,
  5. I left those paper towels in the puddle to soak it up too,
  6. then I used more paper towels to pick up the messy towels and take them to the refuse bin,
  7. I repeated this doing it in a way that would not spread the pint outwards,
  8. I always moved the paper to the middle of the puddle,
  9. Then I cleaned my hands so that I didn’t spread it around.

Using Paintbrush Cleaner

After I had removed a lot of the paint I poured paintbrush cleaner, the variety that can be washed off with water (usually coloured blue), on the remaining paint puddle and the splashes. I then used a hand-held scrubbing brush to work the paintbrush cleaner into the paint. I added more paintbrush cleaner and I could see it washed the slab where I had poured it so that I could see the concrete colour showing through. This was a good sign that the paintbrush cleaner was working to dissolve and remove the paint.

Spilt Paint On My Patio
Patio Cleaning Items

By this time several slabs looked to be in a terrible state, but having done this before (using paintbrush cleaner to remove wet paint from concrete) I knew that the time had come to hose it all away. So I did just that. I washed this area of my patio with clean water from a hosepipe. The paintbrush cleaner went milky, as it does when mixed with water, but after plenty of water was used the patio was as clean as it was before the paint was spilt.

My only remaining problem was – the hosepipe had splashed the window I had just painted. Doh!

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