If you own an old home (at least 80 years old), it’s likely that your interior walls are plaster rather than drywall. Plaster walls are beautiful, durable and far more soundproof than modern drywall walls. If possible, damaged plaster walls should be repaired rather than replaced. However, this is not always a practical option. Sometimes you simply have to replace the plaster walls with new drywall. Here is how you do it.
Prepare the surface by hammering in or removing any old screws, nails, staples or anything else holding onto the surface of the lath. The flatter the lath surface, the better the drywall will lay once installed.
Sand the edges of the mud and any uneven parts of the mud so that the entire wall and seam look smooth in appearance. The point of extending the mud beyond the seams is that when mud is smoothed over a wider surface without edges, it gives the appearance of being perfectly straight and seamless without actually being so. Because we are actually dealing with fractions of millimeters, it simply doesn’t show. Now you are ready to paint.