In short: Artex — the textured coating swirled, stippled or combed onto the ceilings of most British houses between the 1960s and the 1990s — can be plastered over, and skimming is the usual way to get rid of it. There are three approaches: skim directly over the texture, overboard the ceiling with plasterboard and skim that, or remove the coating and skim what is underneath. Which is right depends on how heavy the texture is, how sound the ceiling behind it is, and — before anything else — whether the coating contains asbestos, which textured coatings applied before the mid-1980s often do. Nothing gets scraped or sanded until that question is answered.
What's in this guide 8 sections
01 First: the asbestos question
Textured coatings made before the mid-1980s frequently contained a small proportion of chrysotile asbestos as a binder, and stock kept being used for some years after manufacturers changed the formula. Asbestos in textured coatings was banned in the UK by 1999. So a ceiling in a house built or decorated before then may contain it, and there is no way to tell by looking.
Asbestos in artex is low risk while it is left alone: the fibres are bound in the coating and are only released if it is sanded, scraped, drilled or broken up dry. That is exactly why skimming over it, which seals the coating under a new layer, is the approach most plasterers and most guidance favour for ceilings that are otherwise sound.
Before any work that disturbs the surface — scraping high peaks, removing the coating, or overboarding with fixings through it — the coating should be tested. A sample sent to a UKAS-accredited laboratory costs little and comes back within days. If it is positive, the peaks are not scraped; they are covered with a thicker first coat instead, and any removal is done by a licensed or appropriately trained contractor using wet methods.
We test before we scrape, on every artex ceiling in a pre-2000 house, and we would be wary of any trade that does not.
02 Option one: skim straight over the artex
This is the standard job and the one most people want. The ceiling is checked for adhesion — a loose or flaking coating will take the new plaster down with it — then primed with a bonding agent so the finish plaster keys to a painted, textured surface it would otherwise slide off. Two coats of finishing plaster go on: the first fills the texture and the second gives a flat, smooth surface. Where the texture is heavy, a bonding coat goes on first to bring the surface level.
It works where the artex is well stuck, the ceiling behind it is sound, and the texture is a stipple, swirl or light comb rather than a heavy, deep pattern. The finish is a flat ceiling, typically three to five millimetres thicker than before, ready for a mist coat and paint a few days later.
03 Option two: overboard and skim
Where the texture is deep, the coating is failing in places, the ceiling has cracks that keep returning, or the plasterboard behind it is sagging between joists, the better answer is to fix a new layer of plasterboard over the whole ceiling — screwed through the artex into the joists — and skim that. The artex is sealed underneath and never touched.
It costs more in materials and time, drops the ceiling by around fifteen millimetres, and means the coving, light fittings and any ceiling rose are taken down and refitted. In return you get a genuinely new ceiling with the movement cracks of the old one left behind it. In the 1960s and 1970s housing around Chesterfield, Mansfield and Worksop, where the ceilings were often boarded thinly and the artex was applied heavily, this is frequently the right call.
04 Option three: remove it
Removal — softening the coating with steam or a proprietary gel and scraping it off, then skimming the board or plaster beneath — gives the thinnest result and keeps every millimetre of ceiling height. It is also the messiest, the slowest, and the one that absolutely depends on a negative asbestos test. Even asbestos-free artex comes off slowly and takes the paper face of old plasterboard with it in patches, which then needs sealing and filling before the skim.
It makes sense in a period property where the ceiling height and the original cornice matter, or on a small area. Across a whole house it is rarely worth the extra days over skimming.
05 Which one for your ceiling
| Situation | Best approach | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Light stipple or swirl, well stuck, ceiling sound | Skim over | Quickest, cheapest, seals the coating |
| Heavy or deep pattern | Bonding coat then skim, or overboard | A single skim will show the peaks through |
| Artex flaking or loose in places | Overboard and skim | Plaster will not stay on a coating that is letting go |
| Cracks along the joist lines that keep returning | Overboard and skim | The new board bridges the movement |
| Sagging plasterboard between joists | Overboard and skim, or re-board | The old ceiling is failing, not just the finish |
| Period house, cornice and height matter | Test, then remove and skim | Keeps the ceiling where it was |
| Positive asbestos test | Skim over or overboard — never scrape | Seals the fibres in; removal needs a specialist |
06 How a skimmed artex ceiling is done properly
- Adhesion check across the whole ceiling — a scraper run along it should not lift anything. Loose areas change the plan.
- Asbestos test on any pre-2000 coating before any scraping. If negative and the peaks are high, they are knocked back with a scraper; if positive or untested, they are left and the first coat is made thicker.
- Stain block on any water marks, or they bleed through the new plaster and then the paint.
- Bonding agent — a PVA or, better, an SBR or purpose-made primer — rolled on and allowed to go tacky, so the plaster keys to a painted surface.
- Bonding coat where the texture is heavy, ruled off flat.
- Two coats of finishing plaster, the second trowelled up as it firms to a flat, close finish.
- A week or so to dry — longer in winter — then a mist coat of diluted emulsion before the finish paint, so the paint does not peel off the fresh plaster.
07 Why it goes wrong
- Peaks showing through: the texture was too heavy for a single skim. A bonding coat first, or overboarding, avoids it.
- Plaster cracking or coming away in sheets: no primer, or a coating that was already loose. The plaster never bonded to the ceiling.
- Cracks reappearing along straight lines: the ceiling moves at the joists and a skim cannot stop it. Overboarding can.
- Brown or yellow patches: an old water stain that was not sealed, bleeding through.
- Paint peeling in strips: no mist coat, so the emulsion sat on the surface and never bonded to the plaster.
08 Walls, and whole houses
Artex on walls is skimmed the same way and is usually easier, because wall patterns were lighter and walls do not move like ceilings. The whole-house job — every ceiling skimmed, sometimes every wall — is one we do regularly in the 1950s to 1970s housing across north Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire, typically a room or two a day with drying time in between, and it changes a house more than almost any other single piece of work for the money. It also makes sense to do it before a kitchen or bathroom is fitted rather than after, so the new ceiling goes in over an empty room.