If you are planning a renovation, extension or commercial fit-out, you will quickly run into two ways of finishing internal walls: drylining and traditional wet plastering. Both give you a wall ready for paint, but they get there very differently, and the right choice depends on your building, your budget and your timescale. Here is an honest comparison from a firm that does this work every day across Devon.
Drylining means fixing plasterboard to your walls or a metal or timber frame, then finishing the joints with tape and jointing compound rather than coating the whole surface in wet plaster. The boards arrive as large sheets, typically 1200mm wide, and are screwed to studs, fixed with adhesive dabs directly to masonry, or hung on metal channel systems. Once the joints are taped, filled and sanded, the wall is ready for decoration.
There are two common finishing routes. Taping and jointing leaves the board surface as the final finish, which is standard in commercial work. Alternatively, the boards can be given a thin skim coat of plaster over the top, usually 2 to 3mm, which is popular in homes because it gives that traditional smooth feel. That second option is really a hybrid of both methods.
Traditional wet plastering means applying plaster in layers directly onto the wall, usually a backing coat of around 11mm followed by a finish coat of about 2mm. On older solid walls this might be sand and cement or lime based; on modern blockwork it is typically gypsum backing plaster. The result is a hard, dense, seamless surface with no board joints anywhere.
The trade-off is time and moisture. A wet plastered room puts a lot of water into the building, and each coat needs to dry before the next stage. In a cool Devon winter, a freshly plastered room can take a week or more before it is properly ready for paint, and rushing it leads to trapped moisture and failed decoration.
For most projects, drylining works out cheaper and considerably faster. A competent team can board and tape a room in a day or two, and jointing compound dries in hours rather than days. Wet plastering is slower, more labour intensive and needs more skill on site, which is reflected in the price. As a rough guide, drylining a standard room might cost 20 to 40 percent less than a full wet plaster job, though it always depends on wall condition, access and the finish specified.
Beyond cost, each method has practical strengths worth weighing up:
For new stud walls, ceilings, loft conversions and most commercial fit-outs, drylining is the sensible default. It is faster, more predictable, easier to make good later and pairs well with insulation upgrades. This is why nearly all modern commercial interiors, from offices to retail units, are drylined with metal stud partitions.
Wet plastering still earns its place. If you have a period property with solid stone or cob walls, which are everywhere in the Tiverton and Exe Valley area, a breathable wet plaster system is often the correct choice to manage moisture. It also suits anyone who wants maximum durability or a genuinely monolithic finish. In practice, many of our projects use both: drylined partitions and ceilings with a skim coat where the client wants that traditional finish underfoot the paint.
Yes, provided the joints are taped and finished to a good standard and the boards are sealed with a suitable primer first. Taped and jointed finishes are standard across commercial work, though many homeowners still prefer a thin skim coat for a fully seamless feel.
Sometimes, but with care. Standard plasterboard fixed to a damp solid wall can trap moisture, so older breathable buildings often need a lime based wet plaster or a specialist breathable board system instead. A survey of the wall condition should come before any decision.
Jointed drylining can usually be decorated within a day or two of finishing. A full wet plaster job typically needs around a week to dry, sometimes longer in winter, and always needs a mist coat of watered down emulsion as the first layer of paint.
Tell us about the project. You deal with Jamie direct, from first measure to handover.