You’ve most likely spent hours agonizing over paint colours, furnishings, and decor, attempting to offer your rooms a definite character. However what if the most important affect comes from one thing you’ve utterly neglected? The reply could be molding. Including ornamental trim to ceilings, flooring, and doorways can rework naked partitions into areas that really feel undeniably “completed”—and even enhance your own home’s worth. Right here’s how this often-ignored design factor really works its magic.
The ornamental trim of crown molding provides timeless character and visible enchantment
(Above) Molding and film body molding by Sweeten home-owner
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Crown molding types
You would possibly assume molding is simply, effectively, molding. However identical to any architectural element, there’s a particular perform and aesthetic for every kind. You possibly can strategically add trim to just about any floor in a room, from the ceiling all the way down to the ground, and all over the place in between. Whereas some types supply common enchantment, others are purpose-built for a specific spot. Right here’s a breakdown of the important thing gamers and what makes them important:
Crown molding
That is the showstopper, the “crown” that offers a room its stately end, put in the place the ceiling meets the wall. Crown molding isn’t a one-size-fits-all element; it ranges from modern, minimalist traces to intricate, multi-layered designs that may be mixed for a really bespoke impact. Whereas pre-made choices supply comfort, working with a fabricator permits for {custom} wooden designs.
Casing
Don’t skip this one. Casing isn’t simply ornamental; it’s the trim that well conceals the often-uneven hole between your partitions and door or window frames. Past aesthetics, it performs an important function in stabilizing these openings. For a cohesive, built-in look, casing and baseboards ought to both match or intently resemble one another. This ensures the trim enhances the room with out visually overwhelming it, particularly when paired with a dominant crown molding.
(Above) Kyli and Luke’s image body molding jazzes up plain partitions straight up the stairwell
Chair rail
Usually misunderstood as purely ornamental, the chair rail is a surprisingly sensible design factor. Positioned roughly midway up a wall, its major function is to defend your surfaces from scuffs and dings brought on by furnishings. However its utility doesn’t cease there. As a built-in visible separator, it naturally divides the wall, opening up potentialities for distinct design decisions. Think about portray the areas above and under in contrasting colours, or combining paint with elegant wooden paneling or patterned wallpaper. There’s one other sensible profit too: if a piece will get broken, you solely have to restore or repaint that particular space, not the complete wall, making touch-ups far simpler and cheaper.
Panel molding
For those who’ve ever admired partitions with built-in architectural element, you’ve probably seen panel molding at work. This ornamental trim is particularly designed to border out raised-panel constructions on partitions, giving them a wealthy, custom-built look. Consider traditional examples like beadboard or wainscoting – panel molding is the element that actually defines these timeless types, including depth and a way of permanence to a room.
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Image body molding
This versatile molding serves a shocking twin function. Firs, image body molding enables you to create elegant, framed sections straight in your partitions. These could be left as delicate architectural particulars or additional enhanced with contrasting paint, luxurious cloth, or daring wallpaper to create a bespoke point of interest. Secondly, and maybe extra ingeniously, you possibly can set up this molding close to the ceiling to help hooks for hanging photos. This implies no extra ugly nail holes straight in your drywall, providing a clear, versatile method to show artwork.
(Above) Nazli and Larry’s panel molding, painted a deep teal blue, offers their eating room character.
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Baseboards
Moreover casing, this trim is the commonest. It sits on the juncture between the wall and the ground. The aim is twofold: to guard towards shoe scuffs and to offer the ground a completed look, hiding any separation which will happen because the room settles. You possibly can go slender or extensive right here, as your style and the room’s type dictate.
Medallions
Sometimes used to hide the opening by way of which a lightweight fixture similar to a chandelier descends, medallions are additionally ornamental. Out there in a variety of sizes, apply one or a number of for pure embellishment on a wall, as a substitute for artwork.
(Above) Egg-and-dart molding helps a layer of crown molding in Tina and Fletcher’s kitchen
Methods to use ornamental crown molding
- Crown molding mostly runs alongside the perimeter of two surfaces to hide or soften the looks of the transition between them. Assume window frames or crown moldings, described above.
- It may also be utilized to pleasing and elegant impact to high cupboards or a bookcase, for a built-in, bespoke look.
- Crown molding that’s not less than a pair inches deep may function a wall shelf or plate rail in a kitchen.
- Go even deeper and you may make use of molding for a fireside mantel.
- Drop crown molding a couple of inches from the ceiling and lightweight it for an additional contact of drama in a residing or nice room, or a romantic glow for a eating room. There are two-piece molding programs accessible with lights within the decrease molding that undertaking upward, illuminating the higher piece. Your contractor will help you create an analogous impact with a strip of LED lights.
- Additionally contemplate UL-Listed hole crown molding that may cover frequent family wiring, good for a house workplace.
(Above) Crown molding on the high of those twin home windows and panel molding under in Janet and Jerry’s brownstone.
Crown molding supplies and profiles
Molding is broadly accessible by way of shops like Dwelling Depot and Lowe’s in addition to lumberyards and a few {hardware} shops. You’ll discover a huge choice of profiles—the form or contour that you just see when the molding is seen from its aspect—from crisp, straight edges to sensuous, elaborate curves. Inventory gadgets are available six- or eight-foot lengths.
- Patterns – what you see from the entrance—embrace traditional dentil and egg-and-dart, in addition to floral and summary designs.
As for what molding is made from, the most well-liked choices embrace wooden, in fact, in addition to MDF, plaster, and plastic. All of those supplies could be painted, and the woods could be stained.
- Wooden – Wooden molding is available in a wide range of species, some arduous like maple, and a few mushy like pine. Go for wooden if you wish to match partitions of the identical species or search an impact from a particular grain, like that present in fir or oak. Wooden takes stains, varnishes, clear coating, or paint. Some producers will supply wooden molding pre-primed and prepared for portray.
For an genuine, historic look, try salvage retailers for reclaimed wooden molding from outdated, deconstructed homes.
As a pure materials, wooden will reply to adjustments in humidity so it’s not for rooms with loads of moisture.
(Above) An elaborate ceiling medallion takes the up to date edge off this hyper-modern kitchen in Kavi and David’s historic townhouse. Unique molding frames the doorway.
- MDF – Fabricated from wooden fibers and resin, medium-density fiberboard (MDF) is a steady but versatile materials, appropriate for surfaces that aren’t utterly flat and even. It resists water higher than wooden and is lighter than plaster however heavier than the plastic choices. It ought to come pre-primed, prepared to color or end as soon as put in.
- Plaster – A time-honored molding materials going again a pair centuries, plaster presents a number of alternative in ornate designs. Because it’s additionally heavy and inflexible, it’s not good for rooms the place partitions should not plumb. For knowledgeable installers solely!
- Plastic – There’s a variety of choices inside plastics—polyurethane, polystyrene, PVC. All are versatile to evolve to rooms with curves. They’re additionally light-weight, and therefore simpler to deal with than plaster and a few woods. Of explicit significance, plastics are waterproof, and so is not going to develop, constrict, cut up, or warp from publicity to adjustments in temperature or moisture, similar to a kitchen or tub. They’re additionally simple to chop and are available prepared to color or fake end.
- Metallic – This materials is for rooms with stamped steel ceiling panels.
Methods to set up crown molding
Until you might be an skilled DIYer, it’s finest to work with a professional when choosing the dimensions of crown molding for a specific software. First, you or the contractor might want to match the molding to your own home’s period and décor. Be aware that mid-century structure, in its drive to streamline, did away with most ornamentation. Due to this, it will likely be arduous to search out crown molding examples from this time. Nonetheless, quite simple trim—molding, baseboard, and casings—can improve even a really up to date or minimal area to make the room really feel actually completed. Right here, paint the trim the identical coloration because the partitions.
Choose the fitting crown molding on your house
The array of types and vary of supplies make molding a easy and pretty thrifty addition to a room—when you’ve made your choice! It could possibly rework a room with out requiring you to maneuver a single wall or exchange a little bit of furnishings. If your own home has a historic or conventional heritage, you’ve rather more leeway for selecting various kinds of molding, together with very elaborate types. Have a look at photos of historic properties on-line or in books for period-appropriate inspiration and steerage.
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