Hartford Elite Drywall: Drywall Contractor in Hartford, CT
Hartford Elite Drywall delivers drywall installation, plaster repair, and commercial buildouts across Hartford, Connecticut and the surrounding towns. Our crews handle standard sheetrock, moisture-resistant board, and 5/8 inch Type X fire-rated assemblies, matching the board and finish level to the job, from a single-room repair to a full commercial build-out.
Hartford Elite Drywall works across residential, rental, remodel, and commercial job sites throughout Hartford and the surrounding Capital Region towns, from the pre-1940 plaster-over-lath homes of Frog Hollow and the West End to fire-rated assemblies on downtown commercial floors. Connecticut's winter freeze-thaw cycle and the Connecticut River's water-damage exposure put real stress on old walls and basements, so Hartford Elite Drywall re-secures sound plaster instead of tearing it out, finishes to the GA-216 Level 4 or Level 5 a room needs, and reaches for moisture-resistant board wherever damp is a factor.
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Our Services
Residential and commercial drywall services across Hartford and the surrounding area.
Water Damage Drywall Repair
A water stain never stays just a stain. By the time it shows through paint, the board's paper face is usually compromised, and mold could already be starting behind it. Hartford Elite Drywall removes what's damaged, checks the framing behind it with a moisture meter, and rebuilds with the right board for wherever it flooded. Old basement, burst pipe, roof leak. What we find behind the panel decides what happens next.
Learn morePlaster Repair & Plaster-to-Drywall Conversion
Cracks that keep coming back, a ceiling that flexes when you push on it, plaster that sounds hollow under your knuckles. Hartford Elite Drywall taps and inspects every wall before recommending anything, then repairs sound plaster with washers and reinforced cracks, or converts failed sections to drywall furred flush with your original trim reveals. Either way, the transition disappears into the surrounding wall.
Learn moreDrywall Repair & Patching
The doorknob hole, the anchor holes from a removed shelf, the nail pops bulging through your paint, the corner the movers dinged going out. Hartford Elite Drywall patches it all so it truly disappears: texture matched, feathered in thin coats, and primed paint-ready. We also re-secure nail pops properly, not just fill them, so they do not push back through by spring.
Learn moreCeiling Repair
A stained, cracked, or sagging ceiling rarely means what it looks like. Hartford Elite Drywall diagnoses the cause first, water, movement, or plaster losing its grip on the lath, then seals, repairs, or re-secures accordingly, and texture-matches the patch so it disappears under overhead light. A sagging ceiling gets treated as urgent. What's actually happening above the surface decides what happens next.
Learn moreMold Drywall Removal & Replacement
Mold on a Hartford basement or bathroom wall keeps coming back no matter how many times it gets wiped down, because the drywall itself is holding the colony. Hartford Elite Drywall removes the affected board, coordinates with a remediation contractor when contamination is significant, and rebuilds with mold-resistant drywall matched to the space. A wall that looks clean is not the same as a wall that stays clean.
Learn morePopcorn Ceiling Removal
A yellowed, cobweb-catching popcorn ceiling dates a room faster than anything else in the house. Hartford Elite Drywall tests pre-1980 ceilings for asbestos before touching them, then wet-scrapes or skim-coats over painted texture and finishes the ceiling smooth. What's revealed once the texture is off, old stains, cracks, prior patches, gets fixed before the finish goes on.
Learn moreBasement Drywall Finishing
An unfinished basement is doing nothing but holding boxes, when it could be a family room, home office, or in-law suite. We finish it from framed and insulated to paint-ready: moisture-resistant board where the wall calls for it, insulation built for Connecticut's climate, and the fire separations a permit inspector checks. A permit is required to finish a Hartford-area basement, and that protects you at resale.
Learn moreDrywall Installation & Hanging
An addition framed and waiting on walls, a gutted room ready to close in, a new build hitting the drywall stage. Hartford Elite Drywall hangs and finishes it all, planning the board by room, moisture-resistant, fire-rated, or standard, before a single sheet goes up. Good hanging is what makes a flat finish possible: tight seams, correct fastening, and backing set where cabinets and fixtures will land. We also sub for GCs, sequencing around your other trades.
Learn moreDrywall Taping & Finishing
Drywall is hung but raw, seams, screw heads, and corners still showing before paint. Hartford Elite Drywall tapes, muds, and sands hung board to a smooth surface, building coats to GA-216 Level 4 or Level 5 and checking every wall under raking light before calling it done. Whether it is a builder's conversion floor or a basement you hung yourself, the right finish level is not always the obvious one.
Learn moreSkim Coat & Level 5 Finish
Old texture, patch marks, wallpaper scars, or a wall that flashes under new lighting: paint alone will not hide them. Hartford Elite Drywall skims the whole surface to a smooth, uniform finish, and for demanding light or high-sheen paint we take it to a full Level 5, the highest finish level there is. It is also how rough old Hartford-area plaster comes back to smooth without tearing it out.
Learn moreDrywall Crack Repair
That crack keeps coming back no matter how many times you paint over it. Hartford Elite Drywall cuts out the failed joint and re-tapes it properly, using setting-type compound at the corners and seams that move most with Hartford's seasons. A separated corner bead gets replaced, not just filled, and sometimes a crack is telling you something more.
Learn moreDrywall Texture Matching
A patch that is perfectly flat can still stand out if the texture around it doesn't match. Hartford Elite Drywall matches orange peel, knockdown, splatter, and hand-troweled finishes on walls and ceilings across Hartford and the surrounding towns, testing the mix and technique on a sample before touching the visible repair. Old Hartford plaster and newer suburban texture aren't the same fix, and getting that call right is where most patches go wrong.
Learn moreDrywall Removal & Demolition
Starting a remodel or gut renovation means the old walls have to come out first. Hartford Elite Drywall handles selective demo and full strip-to-studs removal, from modern drywall to the lath-and-plaster common in Frog Hollow, Asylum Hill, and the West End. We test for asbestos and lead before tearing into older materials, contain the dust, and haul every bit of debris away, so the next phase starts on a clean, sound base.
Learn moreSoundproof Drywall
Hearing every word through the wall from the unit next door, or losing focus on a work call because the household won't go quiet? Hartford Elite Drywall builds real soundproofing assemblies, sound-damping board, decoupled framing, cavity insulation and sealed flanking paths, not just a single upgraded board. We diagnose whether you're fighting airborne voices or footfall through the floor first, because the fix is different for each.
Learn moreGarage Drywall & Fire Separation
The wall and ceiling between an attached garage and your house are a code fire barrier, and a Hartford-area home inspector will flag them if missing or wrong. We install the correct board, run 5/8 Type X where a room sits over the garage, cover the required surfaces continuously, and fire-tape the seams so the barrier actually works. We can stop at code-compliant, finish it paint-ready, or take it through a full garage conversion.
Learn moreFire-Rated Drywall Assembly
A fire-rating schedule on the drawings means the GC needs a sub who builds to the listed UL assembly, not just fire-rated board. Hartford Elite Drywall frames and firestops 1-hour and 2-hour partitions, shaft walls, and corridors for Hartford's office towers, medical renovations, and downtown adaptive-reuse conversions, matching every layer and fastener to its published detail. The wall that gets built is the one that passes inspection, firestopping included.
Learn moreMetal Stud Framing & Commercial Drywall
A commercial fit-out only moves as fast as the drywall sub framing it. We self-perform steel stud partitions, demising walls, soffits, bulkheads, and drywall ceilings across Greater Hartford, from downtown insurance-capital office floors to office-to-apartment conversions run unit after unit, laid out from the drawings and backed for casework and equipment before board goes up. Rated and clinical assemblies build on this same framing run.
Learn moreSuspended / Drop Ceiling Installation
A sagging grid, stained ACT tile, or a fit-out that's finally reached the ceiling phase is holding up the punch list. Hartford Elite Drywall installs and repairs suspended ceiling grid and tile for Hartford offices, medical suites, and retail spaces, laying the grid out to center the field and balance the border tiles so it reads finished, not pieced-together. Whether your space needs a full new grid or just the tiles is worth checking before anything gets ordered.
Learn moreWhy Choose Us
We diagnose the cause before we close the wall
A stained ceiling, a crack that keeps returning, a soft wall by the floor line: the right fix depends on why it happened. Hartford Elite Drywall checks whether it is water, mold, movement, or old plaster letting go of the lath before anything gets covered, so you are not paying to repair the same spot twice.
We actually know old Hartford plaster
Frog Hollow, the West End, Asylum Hill, and Parkville are full of pre-1940 homes built with plaster over wood lath, and it fails in ways drywall does not. We know when to re-secure a sagging field with plaster washers and skim it flat, and when a plaster-to-drywall conversion is the honest call, and we fur the new board out so a Victorian keeps its trim reveals. A crew that only hangs new board treats every old wall the same, and it shows.
One crew from a single patch to a fire-rated commercial floor
The same outfit fixes a water-stained ceiling in a triple-decker and frames, rates, and finishes a full commercial buildout downtown. Residential repair, whole-home finishing, and self-performed metal-stud, ICRA, and UL-rated commercial assemblies come from one crew, so a landlord or a facilities manager does not re-explain the job to a new sub every time.
Commercial Drywall Contractor in Hartford, CT
Hartford Elite Drywall works across the capital region's commercial building stock, from downtown insurance-tower floors and the office buildings being converted into apartments to hospital and clinic wings, state and municipal buildings, college and school campuses, senior-care communities, and the suburban retail and restaurant corridors. The settings below cover what we are built to prove out, from occupied clinical containment to repetitive floor-by-floor conversion work.
How it works
- 1
Call and describe it
Tell us what you are seeing, the stain, the crack, the bare studs, the whole floor, and we tell you honestly whether it is a quick patch, a bigger repair with a cause to handle first, or a planned build. Photos or a turnover list are enough to start scoping.
- 2
On-site assessment and cause diagnosis
We look in person and read the cause, not just the symptom. That means a moisture meter on a water stain to map the real wet zone, a tap test on old plaster to find where it has lost its keys to the lath, an asbestos-age check on a pre-1980 popcorn ceiling, and a look behind the board for mold before anything is decided.
- 3
Written quote
A clear written quote covering board footage, the board type, and the finish level. No mystery pricing. For a water-damage claim we format the scope the way Connecticut adjusters expect, with labor, material, and footage itemized, since this is the insurance capital and a lot of the work comes with paperwork.
- 4
Scheduling and site protection
We schedule to your deadline (a lease turn, a listing date, an inspection, a GC's floor sequence), protect floors and furniture, and contain the dust. Containment matters in an occupied old home, and it is required as ICRA hard containment with negative air on an occupied clinical floor.
- 5
Removal and substrate check
Damaged board comes out and we check what is behind it. Dry, clean framing means we reinstall. Mold on the framing means we stop, document, and coordinate a qualified remediation contractor, and the wall does not close until an air-quality clearance passes. In pre-1978 homes we follow lead-safe (RRP) practices because the old paint almost always contains lead.
- 6
The repair or install method
The right material for the condition: moisture-resistant board (USG Mold Tough, PURPLE, CertainTeed GlasRoc) in damp basements and baths, 5/8" Type X where a garage or a rated wall calls for it, plaster washers and reinforcement on a sound old wall, or metal-stud framing and standard board on a new partition. Backing goes in before the board closes.
- 7
Taping and coats
Seams taped and built up in thin coats of joint compound, each feathered wider than the last, with real dry time between them. Rushing wet coats is what makes seams reappear a season later, so the dry time is the schedule.
- 8
Sanding to the finish level
Sanded smooth to a GA-216 Level 4 finish for most rooms, or a full-surface Level 5 skim where raking window light or high-sheen paint would otherwise telegraph every joint. We finish to the level the room and the light actually need and tell you when Level 4 is enough.
- 9
Texture match, prime, and walkthrough
Existing texture is sampled and matched so the repair is not a smooth island, water stains are sealed with a stain-blocking primer so they do not ghost back, and the surface is left primed and paint-ready. We clean up and walk the job with you so the work reads as one uniform surface, not a map of everything that happened to the wall.
Who we help with drywall and plaster in the Hartford area
Old-home & plaster owners
The common call is cracking, sagging, or hollow-sounding plaster in a pre-1940 house: a Victorian or Foursquare in the West End, a flat in Frog Hollow, a home in Asylum Hill, Parkville, or Barry Square, or an old-stock house in West Hartford or Old Wethersfield. Original plaster is troweled over wood lath, and when it loses its keys it cracks over the same doors every year, bellies down, and sounds hollow when tapped. We tap and read the wall to know whether to re-secure a sound field with plaster washers and skim it flat, or convert a failed surface to drywall, and on a Victorian we fur the new board out to keep the deep casing and baseboard reveals. Because the paint on pre-1978 plaster almost always contains lead, we work lead-safe (RRP) and contain the dust. This is the owner who leads with "do you actually understand old houses," not with price.
Water-damage & urgent callers
The trigger is a problem, not a plan: a brown ring on the ceiling, a bubbling ceiling after a storm, a soft wall after a pipe burst, a musty basement after the Connecticut River runs high in spring. January and February are peak burst-pipe season across the metro, when a hard freeze splits a line in an exterior wall and the call comes the same day the plumber leaves. The real questions are whether the board's paper face is compromised and has to come out, and whether there is mold in the cavity before we close it up. We map the wet zone with a moisture meter rather than guess, reinstall with moisture-resistant board (USG PURPLE, Gold Bond eXP, CertainTeed GlasRoc) in old riverfront basements, seal stains with a stain-blocking primer, and document the scope the way a Connecticut adjuster expects when a claim is open.
Renovators, planners & pre-sale sellers
The common call is getting walls and ceilings right for a project or a listing, usually on a spring or fall timeline in West Hartford, Glastonbury, Farmington, Avon, Simsbury, or Manchester. That covers finishing a basement into real living space, with moisture-resistant board below grade, continuous foam insulation for the Connecticut climate, egress for a legal bedroom, and the code fire separation at the furnace room and stairs. It covers taking a dated popcorn ceiling off (tested for asbestos first in any pre-1980 home) and skimming it smooth, resurfacing rough old plaster to a flawless Level 5 under critical light, and the garage fire separation an inspector flags before closing (5/8" Type X under a room above, per IRC R302.6). Cracked plaster and tired ceilings scare buyers and inspectors, so this is often the difference between a clean listing and a renegotiated price.
Landlords & property managers
The common call is turnover: a unit in a pre-war triple-decker or converted two- or three-family in Frog Hollow, Asylum Hill, Parkville, or Barry Square that has to be patched, repaired, and made paint-ready between tenants, and Hartford's majority-renter core turns over all year, not just on an academic calendar (Frog Hollow runs roughly 77 percent renter-occupied). This buyer values a sub who scopes fast from a turnover list or texted photos, handles several units at once, invoices per unit, and knows the recurring damage: anchor and doorknob holes, corner dings, water-stained ceilings, and old plaster that keys off the lath. It runs into water damage and voucher-inspection and security-deposit standards, and the footprint reaches New Britain and East Hartford. One drywall vendor who already knows the buildings and shows up.
Commercial, institutional & GC buyers
The common call comes from a general contractor, developer, or facilities manager on a Hartford commercial floor. Self-performed metal-stud framing and commercial drywall is the base scope, with UL-listed fire-rated demising walls, corridors, and shaft walls (Type X and Type C, firestopped, built to the listing under IBC 707/708/713), ICRA containment for occupied healthcare work at Hartford HealthCare and Trinity Health Of New England, and the change-of-occupancy demising and STC-rated party walls of the downtown office-to-apartment conversions around Pearl and Main Streets. It reaches state and municipal work around the Capitol (prevailing wage, certified payroll, DAS), campus and school renovation on the academic calendar, senior-care and retail buildouts, and suspended acoustical ceilings. We self-perform the trades and carry CT registration, a COI, and bonding for the GC roster. See our commercial page for the full picture.
Areas we serve
Hartford Elite Drywall covers Hartford and the surrounding towns, from the old-plaster neighborhoods of the city core out through West Hartford, East Hartford, Wethersfield, Newington, Manchester, Glastonbury, Bloomfield, and Windsor, and into the ring towns of New Britain, Middletown, Farmington, Avon, Simsbury, South Windsor, and Enfield. Residential and commercial both.
Frequently asked questions
Do you do small repairs and big jobs, or only one? +
Both. The same crew handles a single water-stained ceiling, a whole-home renovation, a basement finish, and a fire-rated commercial buildout. No job is too small to call about, and none is too big to be the right fit.
Are you licensed and insured in Connecticut? +
Yes. Hartford Elite Drywall carries Connecticut Home Improvement Contractor registration through the Department of Consumer Protection and general liability insurance, and provides a certificate of insurance on request. For commercial work we bond where the project requires it and are set up for GC sub rosters and facility credentialing.
Do you work on older homes with plaster, not just drywall? +
Yes, and it is a lot of what we do here. Hartford's older neighborhoods are built in plaster over wood lath. We know when to re-secure and skim sound plaster and when a plaster-to-drywall conversion is the better call, and we match the finish and the trim reveals so a repair does not stand out. In pre-1978 homes we work lead-safe.
How fast can you come out? +
For urgent problems like a sagging or water-damaged ceiling we prioritize the visit, since overhead failure is a safety issue and a wet ceiling only gets worse. For planned work we schedule around your deadline, including lease turns, pre-listing dates, and a GC's floor sequence. Tell us the deadline when you call.
Will my repair be noticeable once it is painted? +
That is the whole job. We match the surrounding texture, feather the finish wide, and prime paint-ready so the repair reads as one uniform surface. Ceilings catch raking light that reveals a bad patch, so we finish them to disappear, not just to fill.
Do you clean up, or do I have to move everything out? +
We protect floors and furniture, contain the dust, and clean up after. Dust control matters in an occupied home and is required in occupied clinical spaces. For most repairs you can stay in the home while we work.
Do you handle the drywall part of an insurance claim? +
Yes. When a water-damage repair is tied to a claim, we document the scope in the format Connecticut adjusters expect, can be on-site for the inspection, and coordinate the drywall portion with the rest of the restoration. This side of the work is routine for us in the insurance capital.
Which towns do you serve? +
Hartford and the surrounding towns: West Hartford, East Hartford, Wethersfield, Newington, Manchester, Glastonbury, Bloomfield, and Windsor, plus New Britain, Middletown, Farmington, Avon, Simsbury, South Windsor, and Enfield. If you are just outside that ring, call and ask.
Get a fast, no-pressure quote
Call or send a few details — we serve Hartford and the surrounding area.
Call (860) 385-8361