Kansai Paint introduces a lime-plaster interior wall paint

Kansai Paint has introduced ALES SHIQUY, described as a lime-plaster interior wall paint, according to the company’s decorative products pages.

The product sits in a growing category: paints formulated to imitate the look of applied lime plaster. The commercial logic is clear — a painter can apply it with a roller or trowel in a fraction of the time a plasterer needs, at a fraction of the cost.

What an imitation cannot reproduce is depth. A lime finish is burnished and slightly translucent, so light enters the surface and returns; a paint imitating it reflects from the top. On a photograph the two can look alike; in a room they do not.

Why this matters

Every imitation product expands the market’s vocabulary and compresses its price. Specialist applicators compete by selling the difference — which means being able to explain, in plain terms, why a burnished lime wall is not the same thing as a lime-effect paint.

What remains unconfirmed

• Whether the product is lime-based or an acrylic imitation of lime.
• The vapour permeability and repairability of the finish.
• Which markets it is being launched in.