Virginia Creeper
By Jec
United Kingdom 
I want to paint the exterior of my cottage but not sure what to do about the mature virginia creeper which is covering one side of the house. It's a lovely plant and I want to keep it. I was told that I could wait for the leaves to drop and then paint the wall with the plant attached. I'm worried though that this would damage or even kill it. Any suggestions?
28 Jul, 2008
Answers
It looks very mature. I would do as you suggest and paint the wall where you can in the winter make sure you buy a plant friendly paint , on the other hand if the paint was not friendly you can regrow like Steve says!!!
29 Jul, 2008
If this helps, when we had the Garden room built, there was a mature Virginian Creeper on that wall which had to go - I was really upset - so I planted a new one last year as soon as I could and it's up the wall and spreading over the tiled roof just as I'd hoped! So if you do lose it, don't worry too much! :-)
29 Jul, 2008
you could probably cut it right back to ground level, paint the house and in no time the creeper will regrow up the wall.
28 Jul, 2008