Interior paints are much more than meets the eye. Few things to remember before decorating your home
Interior paints are much more than meets the eye. Few things to remember before decorating your home
For a good part of the two years after the pandemic, we were all confined to our homes. Many of the conversations focused on the mental repercussions of being forced to stay at home or work at the time. There was a discussion on fitness. So there were new hobbies. There were also talks on rediscovering family bonds. The pandemic brought us with our loved ones under our roofs.
The world is starting to open up again. Our homes remain our offices, courtesy of Hybrid Workplace Development. But what has never been taken care of is within our four walls. This is interior paint.
On average, a baby under six weeks old breathes 86,400 times a day; Three times more than that of a normal adult. In a recent research, 70% of parents agreed that their children spend about eight to 20 hours a day indoors. Even as the ups and downs of the pandemic have affected these numbers somewhat in recent months, it’s safe to say that we spend a lot of time inside our homes as a family.
While AQI (Air Quality Index) is such an acronym that everyone is concerned about, its indoor cousin IAQ (Indoor Air Quality) also has a direct bearing on our lives. Recent reports indicate that in the post-pandemic era, there are times when the IAQ in our country can rise to values that are about 10 times the respective AQI.
sensitive issues
Most interior paints that compromise our IAQ contain volatile organic compounds (VOCs). Studies have shown that one out of every five people is hypersensitive to formaldehyde, a VOC additive found in many interior paints.
While formaldehyde initially found its way into interior paint as an inhibitor of bacterial and fungal growth, the absence of such an additive can have consequences as well. According to recent studies, 76 percent of children in India rely on walls while learning to walk. The walls should be clean.
But given that it is an industry that has grown by leaps and bounds over the years (currently valued at ₹500 billion in India), while the focus is on innovation, today’s interior paints have taken a long The journey has been done.
The recent addition of Silver Ion technology to products ensures that the colors inside your homes are compatible. All this while being equally safe for both humans and pets. Skimping on the premium of such features may seem like a good idea in the short run. But it is not in the big scheme of things. Especially when you know that the paint you use inside your home has the potential to make life better.
With all this in mind, you might think that the walls of your homes are just plain, red bricks. But keeping in mind that life requires colour, there are certain checks you can keep in mind before deciding to light up your walls:
1. Unique Absorption Technology (UAT): Embedded in a polymer backbone, it helps interior paints consistently remove formaldehyde from the air.
2. Keep track of paint’s virus resistanceAnti-bacterial, anti-allergic and anti-odor properties are essential.
3. durability mattersRecent studies have found that curbing children’s play time, whether indoors or outdoors, is 20% likely to cause stress. Recent innovations like dirt pick-up resistance and other color lock technologies ensure that the next time your kids write to their hearts’ content on the walls inside your homes, cleaning up after them isn’t such a big hassle and Nor does it take away the brightness of your interior.
The author is the President of Nippon Paint India.