Hi there,
I have to replace a bath in a bathroom which has had all the tiles painted with what looks like about 4 coats of gloss. It is an absolute mess because gloss is not meant for tiles and the quality of work is less than acceptable for DIY. They have painted the whole bathroom, including all the silicone and taps etc. The bath that is coming out is a corner bath and I am going to fit a standard bath in it's place. This will mean that the lovely paintwork will be disturbed and there will be sections which will be exposed that have never been painted.

I would love to rip the lot out and start again but the customer is not willing to pay for a re-tile (rental property). This leaves me with a dilemma, I need to try and make it look acceptable, so I somehow have to try and match the paintwork (I could call Mr Bean to do it with his stick of...) or do something else? I was thinking of stripping the paint off the tiles about 2 tiles up from the bath (Nitromors or similar) and then painting them properly with tile paint (I hate painting tiles!). I would strip all the paint off all the tiles but the bathroom is tiled floor to ceiling on 3 sides and budget does not permit.

Any ideas? Will Nitromors be ok on tiles and grout? ROLL ON THE DAY WHEN PEOPLE ARE WILLING TO PAY TO HAVE THINGS DONE PROPERLY....

There is a catch with leaving it for the landlord to do because he lives abroad somewhere and I am doing the work through the lettings agent.

If I did not have rent to pay, I would tell them to find some cowboy to do it. I don't like bodging jobs and I have walked away from a lot of jobs where the customer or builder wants to bodge/cut corners. For now I have to bite my tongue and do what they want  

I don't think any of us envies you the task!

Until I saw that the bathroom is tiled on THREE walls my choice would have been to just use cheap tiles and tile over what's there, but that's not an option here. As it's a rented property I'd just sand it all down and paint the tiles with a colour I like because I can only imagine the mess you're going to have if you try stripping it down. You're gonna have a situation that will probably look even worse unless you're prepared for the hassle of chasing out all the grouting and stripping out the silicone.