Graffiti in Toronto (AKA Toronto Street Art) has become a public nuisance even more lately than ever. Toronto Graffiti artists are taking advantage of marking their work in public areas, and this is a form of vandalism. There are areas where people hire professional graffiti artists to create tasteful and admirable artwork but on your garage door? That’s not somewhere you want to ‘admire’ it, is it? I’ll explain how to fix graffiti if it happens to you on your property. Whether you are dealing with graffiti on any part of your house or property, regardless if it is on your garage door, concrete, sidewalk or graffiti on a brick wall, you’ll want to read on to learn how to avoid graffiti tags that were not intended.
How to Prevent Graffiti in Toronto
If there is recent graffiti plastered around your neighbourhood, you will definitely want to take extra precautions to avoid the vandalism altogether. A good idea would be to install security cameras so these people will think twice about marking your property with their tags. You can also plant vines such as ivy on exposed wall areas so graffiti artists won’t include your brick wall as a target. If planting ivy isn’t something you would prefer to do, you can always install a trellis as well. A trellis is basically like a lattice but placed on the exterior walls of your house. It is often used to support various plant vines, but will also look pleasant without plants on it.
Getting Rid of Graffiti in Toronto
So what happens when one morning, you’re on your way to work and something catches your eye on the way to your car? You just found a piece of art left as a present for you by some tagger—only this present is not a favour to you and your family, is it? The important thing to do is act quickly as soon as you find Toronto graffiti tags.
Dealing with Graffiti on Regular Surfaces
You can remove graffiti by spraying it with something called Graffiti Melt and Graffiti Off. This is basically a commercial wax coating that can be sprayed off with a hose and melted off of the external surface. Surfaces that are not protected will need to be painted over again, which can be a hassle.
Addressing Graffiti on Brick
For areas such as brick, you can spray over the graffiti pictures with paint remover and then use a pressure washer to remove the tag. Spray the graffiti-tagged bricks with the paint remover, then let your pressure washer do its magic. The graffiti should wash away, and your brick wall will look as good as new!
Restoring Vandalized Sidewalks
If your sidewalk has been vandalized, you can remove it by using a chemical paint remover and scrubbing it with a wire brush, then pressure washing it away. Voila! You’ll have a pristine sidewalk once again.
Salvaging Graffiti on Wooden Fences
If you find graffiti on your wooden fence, you can remove it with sandpaper, paint thinner, new paint, and a sealer. Start by sanding off the graffiti, apply the paint thinner, and repaint the area to match your fence. Seal it off to protect it from further vandalization.
Additional Tip:
A tip for repainting unprotected painted surfaces is to never follow the outline of the tag but to actually create a square-like fill-in and blend in to appear as if no flaws were made at all. This is important because other taggers are territorial and will tag over someone’s markings with their own, thus creating a collage of unwanted tags all over your property.
Your Ally in Graffiti Removal: Home Painters Toronto Can Assist!
All these processes, while effective, can admittedly be time-consuming and physically challenging tasks. But worry not, you don’t have to do it all on your own. Remember, you have friends in the fight against graffiti—in this case, Home Painters Toronto is just a call away. Call HPT for assistance, as all of these can be tedious processes to do on your own. We are experienced in dealing with such matters, letting you deal with graffiti not with stress but with an informed, confident approach.
For the ultimate combination of prevention and solution to making sure you aren’t a victim of graffiti vandalism, you can have HPT come over and paint over all the exposed areas on your property with an application of epoxy-based paint. This will help ease the quick removal of graffiti paint if ever you get someone who decides to tag your garage door, brick wall, concrete wall or sidewalk. Epoxy-based paint will last about 10 years, so it is definitely worth the investment if you are really worried about being a target.
As written above, this has been a practical guide on how to avoid graffiti on your property. Graffiti in Toronto has become quite a common nuisance, so let HPT help solve the problem before it becomes one. Give Home Painters Toronto a call today at 416.494.9095 or email at email Brian@HomePaintersToronto.com. And don’t forget to follow us on all our social channels below!
