The Best Durable Emulsion for Walls and Ceilings

By Mike Gregory

The The Decorators Forum UK is made up of tens of thousands of professional decorators. Every 6 months we run a series of polls to find the best products on the market, and every time we ask them to tell us about the best durable matt emulsion for walls ans ceilings, British decorators name Crown Trade Clean Extreme. As such, I thought I’d put forward my own review.

The Product

Crown Clean Extreme do a range of durable emulsion products designed for use on interior walls and ceilings. The most popular being the Clean Extreme scrubbable matt, so that’s what I’m going to base this blog on. However, they also do an eggshell, two mould inhibiting emulsions and an anti-bacterial.

Clean Extreme Scrubbable matt has a wet scrub rating of 10,000, which means it stands up very well against scuffs and knocks, not only that, but you can wipe your walls with a damp cloth! It’s also waterproof meaning you can use it in a kitchen or bathroom. It is available at any Crown Decorating Centre and you can get it tinted to any colour in Crown’s vast range.

The Performance

I’ve already mentioned its durability, let’s have a look at its other qualities.

The sheen level of the Clean Extreme is only slightly higher than normal vinyl matt emulsion, meaning you don’t get problems like picture framing and roller marks.

The opacity in colours is great and the opacity in white has improved greatly over the past couple of years.

It sits nicely on top of itself, meaning your second coat goes on very easily.

It has a deep, luxurious finish

The price is quite frankly amazing for what you get!! You are looking at around £50 plus VAT for a tinted 5L tub (trade price). Not bad for a premium trade product and definitely cheaper than the Dulux and Johnstone’s equivalents. I genuinely do believe it is the best durable matt emulsion on the market.

The Downside

I always try to balance my reviews out with both negative and positive comments, but I’m struggling with this one. I think it has the best finish out any durable trade emulsion, it’s the cheapest out of all the premium brands and it’s one of most durable.

Up until recently the opacity of the white was an issue, as it is with most durable paints. Crown have now fixed that problem and changed their formula. It is now called “ultimate opacity” which pretty much tells you everything you need to know. There is a downside to this, the coverage isn’t as good (your paint won’t go very far).

All in all, a great product