Plastering is largely a matter of confidence and you may prefer to start in a low-pressure environment first before hitting your own walls for the first time.

The most important thing for all DIY tasks is a set of correct tools for plastering and plaster boarding.

The skill of plastering is usually learned on the job. It can be taught either through a formal apprenticeship scheme or by working as helper.

There are various types of plastering courses available in England. There are courses for beginners who want to pursue it as a hobby, or want to make it into a career.

When plastering materials with differing absorption, it is a good idea to key the surfaces to be plastered with a PVA bonding sealer.

Within the building trades, plastering is one of the oldest crafts.

The plasterer's featheredge is used for smoothing and straightening the plasterwork. This is possible because of the tapered edge. The other edge is flat and is used for tamping and smoothing concrete. The material used is lightweight aluminum.

With the modern trend for plastered walls painted with neutral and pastel colours coming back into fashion, there are a lot of artexed walls and ceilings, which require plastering over.

Sometimes even if the plastering is done correctly, it gets cracks. In such cases the joint compound may hold too much water and then crack when it dries up.

Contamination in new batches of plaster can result in the drying time of plaster being adversely affected as you will learn and this will cause chaos to applying the "Golden Formula" as used by most plasterers.