"Aura" Self Priming Paint Amazing Review: Benjamin Moore Paint

If you've been in the market to redecorate your home simply changing the wall color can make a huge difference. I have (personally) about 3 years of professional house painting experience under my belt and I have to say Aura from Benjamin Moore blew me away! (Lots of flash on the site, just FYI)


My mother decided to paint over this deep rustic brown color that the living room was with an off White yellow. She showed me the paint chips and asked me how long it was going to take us to get the job done.


I sighed out loud doing the math in my head "2 coats of interior primer, 1 hour dry time between coats, edging, 2 coats of paint, 1 hour dry time...Mom it might take us 2 days to get it all done depending on how fast we work this weekend."


She was shocked.


Her first reaction was to go to the local paint shop (they know her by name there she's changed the wall colors so much) and relayed my story. Thank God for the guy behind the counter introducing her to Aura.


This self-priming paint not only dries in 30 minutes, but also goes on thick, smooth, and is easily controllable. I have never worked with paint like this. You also needed to use a slightly different technique getting it on the wall. You can't technically paint back over it while it's still wet. It, like traditional paint, picks itself back up on the roller, but it seems to be extra sensitive. I found myself rolling in single directions ether up, or down, from the center of the wall...rather than up and backtracking down the wall. Edging was much the same, brush strokes in 1 direction, never brushing back over the same spot twice.


The first coat looked surprisingly good, I was floored. The 2nd coat was more of a touch up coat than anything. Because of the dark underlying color it was important to go and apply the 2nd coat to cover up the brush strokes and our "learning curve" walls, which had thinner applications of the paint.


First coat took 3 hours, 30 minutes dry time, lunch, and then 2 hours for second coat with 30 minutes of drying time. In 6 hours of solid work we got done what I thought, or feared, was going to take us 10+ hours of work.


We used just under 2gals of paint for a roughly 600sq/ft of wall coverage (could be a bit more, don't have the measurements).


For $80 a gallon I felt this paint was WELL worth it. The end product was perfection. It has a very low VOC that can easily be handled with an air purifier while painting or after painting that dissipates in only a few hours afterwards.


I was HIGHLY impressed and if you're looking to save time and still get a perfect finish the extra money per gallon to me is totally worth it.




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