Faux Paint, Murals Finish Posh Homes

Many executives who spend a great deal of money on their homes want their walls to look like leather or stone.
Or even a whimsical fantasyland.
The trend has contributed to a high-touch, highly customized business in painting walls for several artisans. The price of painting a wall can quintuple quickly.
Kent Vesper, a former IT professional, and his wife Rebecca own Vesper Studios of Fayetteville. Kent Vesper estimates there are “a couple dozen” high-end faux finishers in Northwest Arkansas, up from about 10 about a decade ago. The trend in interior wall finishes really took off about five years ago, he said.
The duo charge between $3 and $10 per square foot to paint walls with a base coat and up to five coats of glaze to create a textured look from anything like leather to marble. A dining room painted by a regular contractor might cost $300 but the Vespers may charge $1,800, he said.
If accolades are any indication, their work is good. A children’s room Vesper painted for Brian Hunt, son of the late trucking magnate J.B. Hunt, will be featured in a book published by Better Homes and Gardens due out this summer.
Vesper said about 70 percent of his work is in remodeling and about 30 percent is new construction. He also does a lot of furniture and cabinetry. The rooms he’s painting the most are kitchens, dining rooms and master bathrooms.
Xi Krump, owner of Xi Studios of Elkins, specializes in faux finishes for homes under construction and for room remodels, but she also does custom mural work.
She painted “Rebecca’s Garden,” a memorial to Rebecca Graves Trammel, located inside the children’s library at the Rogers Public Library.
Krump does many commercial projects and said she’s seen a trend of people hiring her to paint nurseries and children’s rooms.
In 2005, she painted the home of Mary Beth and Tim Brooks. Mary Beth Brooks is the president and CEO of The Bank of Fayetteville and Tim Brooks is a lawyer with the Taylor Law firm of Fayetteville.
The couple got “faux-itis,” as Krump calls it, and most of the walls of the home have had her touch. She also painted a mural for the Brooks’ son, Sam, featuring characters from the Dr. Seuss book “Green Eggs and Ham.”
“She’s amazing,” Brooks said of Krump. “When she says she’s going to have something done, she’s going to have it done.”
Brooks recently hired Krump to update BOF’s boardroom and library.
Krump said prices on mural work are on a bid basis, so she wouldn’t quote an hourly rate. Though Vesper doesn’t do mural work, he said the going rate is usually between $300 and $500 per day.
As for trends, Vesper said the local market is still demanding the sandstone and country French look, though there has already been a national turn to “modern,” a style of clean lines and metallic paints.
“I’m very bullish about faux finishing going forward,” Vesper said. “My business is almost recession proof. When new construction drops off, remodeling picks up.”