Finishing a new wall or room with plaster or joint compound takes practice. If you have no experience with plaster or its near relative, joint compound, don’t learn in your living room. Experiment ...

Q: I took off the wallpaper in my turn-of-the-century house to reveal real plaster. It has never been painted, and it is a little rough. I plan to paint the walls. When we filled several holes with ...

Q:I have a 1940s-'50s-era plaster house with many cracks around the ceilings. I really don't think I have enough space in the cracks to shove in Sheetrock tape. Can I just apply drywall joint compound ...

Before you do any plaster patching, rid the rooms of any residual lead. If you try to vacuum up chips or dust, you must use a special HEPA filter-equipped vacuum cleaner. Some tool rental stores rent ...