Keep Fingerprints Off Walls

For the most part, fingerprints do not get on the wall. Most places in your house are not in constant contact with hands, but in the few places where this happens, ugly smudges are usually covering the area. When feeling around for something along the wall, people will often leave fingerprints. The most common places for this to happen are the areas around light switches and electrical outlets.

To keep these areas from getting dirty, fasten rectangles of clear acetate on the wall around the faceplates of your light switches and commonly used electrical outlets. This allows people to come in contact with the acetate rather than with the paint on the wall. The acetate has less of a tendency to absorb the oil from your fingers, so it will stay cleaner longer, and will also be easier to clean up when it does become smudged.

Make sure that when you are purchasing and applying the acetate it is several inches taller and wider than the faceplate. Carefully measure your light switch or outlet faceplate and cut a hole of that size in the center of your acetate rectangle. If you use dry-erase markers to draw out your measurements on the plastic, the marks should come off easily with a paper towel when you are done.

The easiest and least intrusive way to attach acetate plates to your wall is to use 3M adhesive strips. They are the kind with a non-adhesive tab that you can pull down to release the acetate rectangle from your wall. The adhesive strips are white and will blend in with your wall, but the tabs will need to stick out from behind the acetate. This option will not damage your paint and leaves you the option of removing the acetate plates later.

Another way to attach the acetate to your wall is to use screws. This option is more permanent, but depending on your decorative preference, it may make your home look more institutional than welcoming.

If you do not want to measure out the sizes or anything of the sort, you can actually buy special plates from a hardware store that have the same effect. It will cut down on the amount of work by a little bit, and also come in the right sizes.