Excellent • Trustpilot Score: 4.8Protection that lets your home naturally breathe
Built to protect heritage and older homes while maintaining natural breathability, our next generation masonry paint helps keep walls drier, healthier and protected for life.
The problem with standard masonry paint
Rain gets in
Standard masonry paint soaks up rain over time. When rain hits day after day, moisture makes its way through the paint and into the wall, making it harder for your home to dry out as it naturally should.
Moisture can't get out
At the same time, most paints form a film across the surface of exterior walls that seals them. Moisture struggles to escape, creating stress beneath the surface rather than allowing the wall to recover naturally.
Paint fails
Moisture builds inside the wall, damp appears, paint peels, the wall remains wet and problems begin to spread beyond what you can see.
Your home stays wet
Moisture builds quicker than it escapes
Older and traditional homes are built with solid walls that absorb a large amount of water, relying on natural breathability to release this moisture gradually over time.
Breathability is essential for your home, but on its own it only controls how moisture leaves the wall, not how much water is absorbed in the first place.
When solid walls are soaked again and again by rain they can struggle to dry, taking on water faster than they can release it. Moisture held within the wall leads to damp, paint peeling and deeper problems that develop gradually from the outside in.
The next generation in paint
Standard masonry paint often forces a compromise – focus on breathability and leave walls exposed to rain, or focus on protection that restricts the natural ability for your home to breathe. For older homes, that compromise is where problems begin.
But you shouldn’t have to choose, with our cutting-edge nano-technology, you get the best of both worlds.
How it works
Super hydrophobic
Protection starts by stopping rain soaking into your home. Our clever nano-technology creates a super hydrophobic surface that causes rain to form beads that simply roll off your walls, reducing absorption by as much as 96%.
Highly breathable
Instead of sealing the wall, our nano-technology lines the pores so does not block water vapour movement. With SD values below 0.03, our technology has the same breathability as limewash, making it suitable for use on older and heritage homes.
This means your walls stay dry, healthy and protected, so you can feel confident you’ve solved the problem properly and won’t be dealing with the same issues again in a few years.
What this means for you and your home
Long-term protection
By keeping walls dry, our paint has extreme durability with a 25 year proven performance and comes with a lifetime guarantee.
Reduced risk of damp
Walls stay drier, protecting your home from damp developing within the structure over time.
Confidence you’ve done it properly
Dry walls mean healthier walls, giving you confidence that the work you’ve done supports the long-term health of your home.
The same breathable protection. Your choice of finish.
Every exterior wall deserves protection that breathes. You may want to transform the look of your home with colour or maintain the natural beauty of masonry as it is.
That’s why we created two products, built to perform in exactly the same way while giving you a choice of appearance.
‘The best masonry paint on the market… nothing comes close.’
The Decorators Forum
Tested. Certified. Guaranteed.
For us, performance isn’t a promise, it should be tested and proven. After all, you deserve to know exactly what you are using on your home. Independent testing, third-party certification and a lifetime guarantee mean you know your home is protected year after year.
Independently Tested
It’s easy to make claims but we believe in proving them. Every performance claim we make, including breathability, has been independently tested and validated by a UKAS accredited laboratory.
BBA Certified
Emperor Masonry Paint has been awarded the BBA Agrément Certificate, a mark of excellence that represents the highest order of product certification available in the UK.
Lifetime Guarantee
In an independent 25 year weathering test, Emperor Masonry Paint and Emperor Masonry Creme showed no change in performance or appearance. Based on this we offer a lifetime guarantee.
Protect your home, the right way
If you want to protect your home without risking hidden problems later, choose protection that works with it, not against it.
Start your project with a sample or speak with our technical team for practical guidance to help you decide the best approach for your project.
Our community
You've got questions? We've got the answers
Will this protect my home without changing how it was meant to work?
Yes, our nano-technology is designed to work with your home, not against it. Instead of forming a plastic film or sealing, like many modern masonry paints, it lines the pores of the surface. This maintains an open-pore structure that lets the wall breathe naturally.
It supports how the wall works by reducing water intake while still allowing moisture to escape, helping it dry more efficiently.
How does this help care for an older home over the long term?
Breathability is essential in older homes, which is many people believe the only safe options are not painting them or using limewash. The issue isn’t paint, it’s paint that negatively impacts breathability, which is often the case with modern, acrylic formulations. Emperor Masonry Paint has been engineered specifically avoid that, allowing walls to naturally breathe.
Older walls are designed to release moisture naturally, but that does not mean large amounts of water are harmless. Every time rain soaks into a wall, it can put stress on the surface and increases the risk of damage over time.
By reducing how much rain is absorbed while still allowing moisture to escape, Emperor Masonry Paint helps limit that stress and supports the long-term health of older homes.
How is breathability tested?
You good news is you can find out how breathable a paint is to ensure it’s right for your home.
Breathability can be measured and tested through a water vapour permeability test called the ‘cup method’ to the BS EN ISO 7783:2011 Quality Standard. This ISO 7783 standard is a specific method for determining the water vapour transmission properties of coatings of paints, varnishes and related products. This test allows for the calculation of an SD value. The lower the SD value, the higher the breathability.
Generally paints with SD values below 0.5 are considered breathable, while limewash is often measured to have an SD value of 0.01-0.03.
On completion of independent UKAS accredited testing both Emperor Masonry Paint and Emperor Masonry Creme were found to have SD values below 0.03, on par with the breathability of limewash. This SD value was consistent both on pre-weathered and weathered samples, demonstrating the SD value across the lifecycle of the paint.
What surfaces is it suitable for?
Emperor Masonry Paint and Emperor Masonry Creme are suitable for almost all masonry surfaces, including brick, stone, sandstone and render.
They are also suitable for lime render and lime-based materials where breathability is especially important.