How to Finish Uneven Drywall

A drywalled wall that has visible ridges and seams likely wasn't properly finished to begin with. There are a few ways of addressing this, including pulling off the tape and plaster from the seams and re-taping. However, if the problem is across the whole wall, this may be more work than it's worth. Another, easier solution is to skim-coat, which is simply a process of spreading plaster very thinly over the wall to fill in the low spots and flatten everything out.

Plastic tarps
Stepladder
Ladder
Wide drywall knife
Electric sander with medium sandpaper
Broom
Premixed skim-coat plaster
Fine sandpaper

Instructions

- 1
  Take the furniture out of the room. Lay out tarps to protect the floor.
- 2
  Run your drywall knife forward over the whole wall, section by section, knocking off any loose material.
- 3
  Sand the wall lightly with your sander, section by section, to get the surface dull and clean. Use a broom to brush off the dust.
- 4
  Use your drywall knife to scoop up skim-coat plaster and press it to the wall, near the top. Spread the plaster thinly, setting the knife at a steep angle to the wall, getting the coat paper-thin over most of the surface but filling in the indentations and lines.
- 5
  Repeat, section by section, doing the whole wall.
- 6
  Let the plaster dry for eight hours. Sand the surface by hand, lightly, with fine sandpaper. If the wall still doesn’t look flat and smooth, repeat the skim-coat process.

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