I Painted My Tile Floor! How To and Review

I did something I NEVER thought I'd do . . . it involves paint (lots of it) and our old brown/orange tile floor. With help from CuttingEdgeStencils, and a lot of Rust-Oleum paint, I painted our bathroom floor. Here's how I did it and what I learned along the way!

You'll need:

Rust-Oleum Floor Paint (Coat 1, Coat 2)

Frog Tape

Small roller and paintbrush

Stipple brush (if you have grout lines)

Socks (a lot)

Stencil (if you choose to stencil)

This is the BEFORE. I used Rust-Oleum floor paint in Coastal Fog and Charcoal Gray. Coastal Fog was the first coat, and Charcoal Gray was the honeycomb/hexagon coat. I won't lie, it took a while to find the dark paint, because all the stores around me didn't have the DEEP TINT base for the Rust-Oleum paint. They had the light base, so I was able to get Coastal Fog floor paint easily. But I had to get two quarts of Charcoal Gray from Home Depot after searching for a week.

Step 1: Clean your floors.

Clean them GOOD. I swept, vacuumed, wiped down, vacuumed again, and used Rust-Oleum floor cleaner and Krud Kutter spray. 

Step 2: Tape off.

Try not to get your tape on the tile or you'll pull it off at the very end and some of the floor paint will come off and you'll be super frustrated and your husband will have to use a box cutter to cut the tape away. 

Step 3: Paint base coat.

Here is the floor after one coat of Coastal Fog (left) and then after two coats (right):

I waited 4-6 hours between each coat to let it dry. This first paint job was pretty easy! The paint went on well, I used a paintbrush for the edges/corners, and it dried well. 

But the hard part was just beginning . . .

The stencil I used was Honeycomb by CuttingEdgeStencils. Their packaging and instructions were wonderful, I was feeling really confident. Their stencil even came with some mini practice stencils and stipple brushes.

Step 4: Tape stencil down and paint!

I taped the stencil down, made sure to look for stray hairs (hair/fuzz will be a BIG pain when it comes to floor painting), and I used a small roller with barely any paint on it. The more paint, the worse it will turn out. 

After rolling the roller in paint, I rolled it over a paper towel to really dry it out. Then I rolled it over the stencil lightly. I realized quickly the grout lines would be a problem. We have textured tiles and thick grout lines, so I went back over them with the small brush. 

Step 5: Repeat, Repeat, Repeat.

I had to wait 10-15 minutes after each stencil section to lay the stencil down again. With the pattern I chose, I couldn't just randomly lay it out on my floor while one section dried. I had to go piece by piece, making sure it all matched up. 

Step 6: Keep stenciling, add a second coat.

If you look at the earlier pics above, the paint wasn't even, and some hexagons looked better than others. I felt REALLY discouraged in the beginning, thinking, "What did I get myself into?"

As I stenciled more and more, I started to see it all come together. Yes, up close it was VERY messy and not crisp or clean, but the floor was starting to take shape. After we added a second coat, it looked much better. 

This night was the funniest/most frustrating because I asked Jonathan to help for a minute, and after 5 minutes he said, "Why don't we just rip out this tile and get new one?" and I looked at him with such a blank face and said "THAT'S WHY WE ARE PAINTING IN THE FIRST PLACE! Because you said we weren't going to rip out the tile!" It was mostly funny, but by 11PM that night, we were regretting this. 

Step 7: Clean up the messy parts.

After stenciling, messing up, waiting for things to dry, and wishing it was all over, I finally got most of the floor done. One of the final steps is to go back with a small paintbrush (like a tiny one for watercolors) and clean up the white lines and touch up. 

The reason I put "socks" on the list is because each time I went in to paint, I switched out my socks. My old socks would track in hair, fuzzies, and random specks. Finding stray hairs was the WORST part of this, or realizing I painted a hair into the floor. New socks will help each time. Barefoot is too sticky and would leave a footprint on the floor when I walked on it. 

Step 8: Paint the clear top coat and let dry for 24-72 hours.

This last step was easy, except for the part where I kept looking at all the flawed parts of the floor and internally criticized myself. But then I stepped back and went WOW!!

The end result:

How I really feel:

HELPFUL TIPS + TRICKS FOR PAINTING FLOORS

1. Pick a stencil that fits your floors. I still love the Honeycomb style and would pick it all over again, but if I went with a single-square stencil (a stencil that fits perfectly over one square tile), this would've been a LOT easier. I would've avoided the grout lines and been able to fly through this.

2. Careful on the corners. The edges/corners were the hardest part. The CuttingEdgeStencil came with a single hexagon stencil, so that came in handy when I had to complete half of a hexagon. Sometimes we folded/bended the stencil to fit against the bathtub or in tricky spots around the toilet. It did NOT turn out perfect, so be ready to touch up or paint a hexagon freehand. 

3. Vacuum in between each coat. The stray hairs and specks were driving me insane. I had read other blogger's experiences before, and some said to paint as quickly as possible (within 1-2 days right away) so your floors don't sit and accumulate dust and dirt. 

4. Get some Tylenol for your back and knees. I did SO much squatting, bending over, and moving around, my body was feeling it after the first day. Depending on your room, you may not have a place to sit (and you don't want to sit right on your freshly painted floors). 

5. Buy 2 stencils. If I did a floor again (which I won't haha), I would get 2 stencils and cover more ground. Or, I'd use the other stencil as the "clean" stencil and switch off. My stencil got messy pretty quickly, so when I went to lay it down for the next section, sometimes the dark paint would get onto the floor in places I didn't want it to! After that happened, I wiped my stencil down after each use (mostly wiped down the back of the stencil, the side that was going to be touching the floor). The top of the stencil got thick with paint, so only once did I peel off all that paint to get a "fresh" stencil. 

6. Paint your floor all one color. If you don't find a stencil you love, pick one color and paint your tile. It looks really good, and it's WAY easier than stenciling! The Rust-Oleum paint is made specifically for floors and has a formula that is meant to last. I'll probably do another post in 6 months to share how well the floors have held up. 

I didn't sand or prime because Rust-Oleum paint covers it all. I did 2 coats of Coastal Fog, 2 coats of Charcoal Gray, and 2 coats of the Matte TopCoat. 

Let me know what you think! Check out my Instagram Reel and TikTok video to see more of the process. 

Thanks for following along!