Excerpts from
A Guide to Glazes

...Pro Faux Workshops and Tools, well-known for its comprehensive educational classes, offers an extensive line of glazes. In addition to a wide range of premixed glaze colors, Pro Faux now offers two exceptional clear acrylic glaze products in gallons for the professional: Pro Faux's Glazing Liquid is used for many simple glazing techniques, and Pro Faux's Scumble Glaze is used primarily for more complex finishes, like marbling, which requires the use of softening brushes. Anyone may purchase these glazes through Pro Faux's Web Site.

Pro Faux's Glazing Liquid is easy to use and has one of the longest open times of any waterbased glazing liquid on the U.S. market. It is designed to be tinted with any custom tinted latex paint for general glazing techniques.

In addition, Pro Faux's Glazing Liquid is a superior "dead flat" acrylic glaze — particularly useful for camouflaging imperfect walls as well as creating Old World wall finishes without the need for zero-gloss varnish. If desired, the sheen can be increased by adding higher glossed latex paint when mixing.

Pro Faux's Scumble Glaze is easy for use for more complicated finishes which may need to be softened with brushes, like more marbling techniques. It tints well with fluid acrylics and universal colorants for more intensity and translucency.

According to John Catalanotto and Greg Frohnapfel of Pro Faux, glazing can encompass an array of finishes like ragging, dragging, sponging, leathering and more. "Pro Faux's Glazing Liquid is used for these simple bread -and-butter finishes that account for 80 percent of more decorative painters work fro designers and homeowners," they said. "Pro Fact's Stumble Glaze can be used for the remaining 20 percent of the glazing work."

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...Likewise the experts at Pro Faux cited several key features to look for in a glaze. "The most important property in a faux-finishing glaze for today's larger interiors include extra-long open time, correct sheen, non-yellowing, sag resistant, low odor, readily tintable with latex paint, fluid acrylic and universal colorants, " they said. "Variants in specific projects that might affect which properties are most important to the painter include temperature, humidity, surface porosity, air movement, unbroken surface area, complexity of finish, desired sheen, and whether the glaze is brush-and-roller friendly."

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Mean while, the Pro Faux experts noted, "Despite yesterday's bad experiences with latex glazing liquids, today's professional faux finisher has learned that water-based means convenience and compliance."

While the very few water-based formulations work for the serious decorative artist, they noted that the performance of Pro Faux's Glazing Liquid exceeds expectations and can take the place of oil-based formulations for simple techniques.

Pro Faux stressed that acrylic resins vary considerably in quality and quantity within water-based glaze products. "Better acrylic resins tend to be used in higher quality products for their superior toughness, flexibility, color range, film tightness, high spread rate, superior adhesion an non-yellowing characteristics," they said. "Therefore, acrylic glazing products generally cost more than their latex counterparts."