Old World Plaster is one of my favorite textured faux finishes. There are several types of plaster. Some are smooth and some have a rough/sandy texture. I like to use the smooth finish plaster. It is achieved in four different steps. First the plaster is troweled onto the walls. The second step is lightly sanding with a fine grit sanding pad. I then base coat the walls with 2-3 coats of latex satin or pearl finish paint. Any color can be used according to your taste. I often use a lighter tone so the glaze shows up more. The last step is the glazing. It is always done with a darker color. I use a square kitchen sponge (dipped into a bucket of water then rung out)and wash it into the texture of the plaster in a circular motion. I then wipe the glaze off the wall, so that most of the glaze settles into the recessed areas of the plaster. The glaze brings an antique look to the wall. The Old World Plaster paint finish can easily cover any simple imperfections that were previously in the wall. This beautiful and rich faux finish gives the wall so much dimension and character. 
I just finished working on a fun project - a 4' x 4' puppet theater that my customer has made for her two twin nieces. They asked me to fun, whimsical, yet realistic flowers. They brought the piece to me already painted the same yellow as the girl's bedroom (you can see it through the opening in the pictures below) I suggested painting it over so instead of blending into the walls, it would stand out. I chose to do background colors of blue and green as a backdrop for the mural, blue for the sky and green for the land.
After doing the background color, I painted the clouds. Then I painted the green of the grass, leaves, and flower stems. The flowers and butterfly's were last.
You can click on the pictures to enlarge.
