I painted my daughter's room in Duration last fall. It was good paint. It seemed a little on the thin side and needed to be stirred almost constantly (I was using pretty bright pinks so that may have been due to the colorants). I did not find it gritty. I find the matte finish to have more gloss than I wish it had-if I walked into the room I would guess that someone had used eggshell. Overall a decent experience with decent results. If you are looking for a scrubbable matte finish you need to consider BM Aura matte. It is simply another level of paint entirely-IMO it is light years better than anything else I have ever used. After the Duration my wife fell in love with a BM Affinity Red color for our dining room-my first thought was "oh great. RED." and my second was "you want me to pay HOW MUCH for a gallon of this stuff???"-now I'm a convert. Don't let your bad impression of BM Regal keep you away from Aura. You can get SW colors mixed in it, and there is nothing as durable or scrubbable.

Richard First let me say that Aura paint is far and away the most durable paint in the industry but if you want to look at it in terms of only savings which is kind silly since the labor is by far the most expensive part of the job I will show you how Aura s better. Example: Aura paint any color any finish: around $50 per gallon Regular paint varies on color between $30 to $40 a gallon depending on depth of color high quality Primer around $30 if you prime with a light color you can get away with 1 coat over primer, but always best to use 2 coats of paint since paint looks lke swiss cheese under a microspoe and the second coat of paint gives you a more durable finish. Therefore you should use 1 coat primer and 2 coats finish coat. cost for this roughly gallon per coat gallon primer $30 2 Gallons medium tan color $70 (35 each) This job would be a good 3 coat job for $100, not to mention if you dont wash rollers out and the time it takes you to do the other coat the price would rise. IF THIS WERE A DARK RED you would need a tinted primer and 3 coats on top of that costing around $150 since the darker colors are around $40 a gallon and you would need an extra gallon Cost of job with Aura 2 coats guaranteed $50 or $55 each gallon TOTAL $100 or $110 every time with either a white or the deepest red. The paint itself as I show in the link is durable enough to wash off black sharpie magic marker and cover it in 1 coat. Popular science rated it as one of the best new products of 2007 and if you were to use any other paint it would end up costing you more in time, paint, environment, supplies and in short you paint wont hold up nearly as well. Now I proved how Aura is not more expensive in fact is can be less money to use. I would think if you are going through the effort to to paint you might as well be prepared to pay a few more dollars if you had too to ensure the best job with the longest lasting finish. Richard watch the video below. The reason why Aura is better is the re-invented the pigment process. traditional paint with all companies use universal pigments to work with oil and water base paints. The is a problem y with dark colors that require more pigment. The universal pigment does not have good hiding and durable properties to it. the old universal pigments are great for manufacturers since they only need 1 expensive mixing machine to do all paints and the pigment does not clog the machines up since it does not dry. AURA PAINT partnered with the machine makers to have water injection mixers to keep wet to enable to create a water-born acrylic resin pigment only made for AURA. The result is you can actually use the pigment to paint with it's the same durable and coverage as the paint it self. Therefore, it covers 3 to 4 times better and holds onto the surface way better since it's formula is 100% bonding. it is even stronger then primer. Also the pigments allow it to be a true LOW VOC "green" paint. I hope this help richard Here is a link that might be useful: AURA NO PRIMER DEMONSTRATION *SUPERIOR

REGAL SELECT Thanks, christophern... but actually Ben Moore has a new exterior paint called Regal Select that I was referring to. It's tinted in the same machine as the Aura, the one that adds resins rather than the one that adds oils and more VOCSs. It's the step up from Moorguard, etc. That's the one I'm considering.

Hmmm, okay. Thanks for responding! Most of the houses in our neighborhood have flat solid or semi solid stain or pretty flat paint so to keep in with the look I may have to go with the flat Duration then if I don't use Aura. Sounds like the satin might be too shiny.