House Painters in Bernardsville, NJ

Bernardsville is a Somerset Hills borough of almost thirteen square miles. It split from Bernards Township in 1924 and is named for Sir Francis Bernard, a colonial governor of New Jersey; the settlement was called Vealtown until 1840. Most of the borough uses ZIP code 07924, with a small share in 07931. After the Civil War, wealthy New Yorkers came to the Bernardsville Mountain, first as summer visitors and then as year-round residents, and once the Gladstone Branch railroad was built through town in 1872 they could commute to the city daily and built large estates here.

The Census Bureau's American Community Survey for 2020 to 2024 counts about 2,800 homes in Bernardsville. A quarter, 25 percent, were built in 1939 or earlier, and 71 percent before 1980, with the 1950s the busiest postwar decade at 19 percent. The 1980s added another 14 percent. The borough's one historic district is the Olcott Avenue Historic District, about 46 properties along Olcott Avenue and parts of Childsworth and Highview Avenues and Church Street, just north of downtown. It was added to the New Jersey Register in May 2009 and the National Register that November, and its period of significance runs from 1899 to about 1930, with Tudor Revival, Shingle Style and Arts and Crafts houses among its buildings. Bernardsville station is on the National Register too.

The Somerset Hills Historical Society reported at the time that the designation would not restrict what homeowners can change on their private property. Bernardsville's Historic Preservation Advisory Committee, founded in 2002, comments on development applications that go before the Planning and Zoning Boards rather than approving paint. We found nothing that requires approval of an exterior color in the district, but if your project is part of a larger application, ask the borough how it will be reviewed.

Older and larger houses set the scope. Tudor half-timbering, shingle siding and deep eaves take hand prep: washing, scraping back to sound coating, replacing failed caulk, and priming bare wood before premium Benjamin Moore or Sherwin-Williams finishes, with stain kept as stain where the wood was never painted. Inside, paneled rooms, built-ins and original cabinetry are sanded and refinished rather than replaced. Seven homes in ten here predate 1980, so the EPA's Renovation, Repair and Painting rule often applies: paid work that disturbs more than six square feet of paint in a room, or twenty square feet outside, on pre-1978 housing needs a certified firm. NJ Painting Co. is not EPA Lead-Safe Certified. If your Bernardsville house would need more than that scraped or sanded, a certified contractor has to handle it, and we tell you so when we walk the house.

NJ Painting Co. is a family-owned company based in Morganville, Monmouth County, and every Bernardsville estimate is free.