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TRENDS

Just Because You're Green
Doesn't Mean You Have to Be Drab

Long before “green” became a buzzword, The Old Fashioned Milk Paint Company from Groton, Mass, began producing a natural, green paint, in twenty deep, rich colors.

Forty years ago their founder, Charles Thibeau recreated an ancient formula for natural milk paint to be used in his newest venture of making reproduction furniture. Milk paint, a homemade, long lasting paint mixed on the spot using local ingredients, was the finish of choice for many early colonists wanting a splash of color in their homes. Its roots, though, stretch back much further in history, with traces of milk paint found in King Tut’s tomb and in early cave paintings in France.

After spending years researching old formulas and experimenting in his basement, Charles created the perfect mixture of crushed limestone, milk protein, clays and earth pigments. The early colonists would have used skim milk or buttermilk, but Charles chose to use the basic protein (casein) in a powder form so the paint ingredients could be saved and simply mixed with water when he was ready to paint.

People from far and wide wanted to buy this legendary milk paint they’d been searching for, the paint that had fallen out of favor since the paint can was invented, and since the modern marvel of latex paint revolutionized the paint world.

Fast forward thirty-six years. The Old Fashioned Milk Paint Company has over 400 dealers in the U.S. alone, and several more distributors worldwide. The carbon footprint of shipping paint in powder form is much smaller than of commercial paint, as they market powder, not water. It also allows us to package a paint without toxic preservatives, keeping our paint as pure as when the colonists mixed up their homemade versions on the back porch.

Now, Milk Paint is not just for the furniture and other porous surfaces. After much experimentation there is a new SafePaint for people looking for a safe alternative to the many toxins found in today’s wall paint. Milk Paint has developed a new line of milk paint that has the same great adhesion and the same luminescent quality for which the original formula is known, but for previously painted walls and new drywall.

Another example of an old technology solving a modern problem.

For more info: Tivoli Paint, 395 State Road Vineyard Haven, 508-696-3152