Wood moldings can be used to frame ceilings, floors, doorways, fireplaces, cabinets, built-in bookcases and windows. They are among the easiest ways to add substance and detail to your rooms.
“The architectural elegance inherent in wood moldings adds charm and character to the home,” the Wood Moulding & Millwork Producers Association declares in its brochure, “How to Build Up Wood Mouldings to Create Larger Profiles.”
“Its application is a low-cost means to increase the value of the home.”
The wide variety of molding patterns makes design possibilities almost limitless. You can install a single molding pattern or combine it with other moldings to create elaborate “built-up” designs, says the WMMPA brochure. “Elaborate patterns that reflect the historic richness of colonial America are often difficult, if not impossible, to find, but you need not settle for less.
“You can create them yourself with `built-up’ moldings — that is, moldings combining one standard profile with one or more other standard profiles to create the traditional look you desire.”
Consider some of the pattern possibilities, according to a glossary from the Hardwood Manufacturers Association:
*Baguette: A simple, narrow, convex molding.
*Billet: A molding made up of several bands of raised cylinders or rectangular segments.
*Cove: A molding that features a quarter-round channel and a square back.
*Dentil: A molding composed of a series of small, rectangular blocks.
*Egg-and-tongue: A molding composed of alternating oval and pointed elements.
*Reed: Molding made up of closely spaced, half-round convex profiles.
*Ropes: A molding carved to simulate the twisted strands of cordage.
*Dovetail: A molding carved with interlocked triangles.
*Reglet: A molding of rectangular cross section, often used in fretwork.
The crown molding on a living- or dining-room ceiling is one of the classiest design details you can add.
It can be very simple — a single ogee profile, for example — or it can be much more elaborate by combining ogee with dentil, reed and cove.
“In low-ceiling rooms (8 feet), single molding profiles usually work best,” says the WMMPA. “A series of built-up moldings would have a tendency to make a low ceiling appear even lower. But if your ceilings are high (10 feet or higher), there is no limit to the rich three-dimensional elegance you can add to the room’s appearance with the creative application of built-up moldings.”
Single molding profiles are most commonly used to frame doors and windows. “But by adding other patterns, the basic trim can be easily transformed into a window or door casing of classical depth and beauty,” says the WMMPA.
Base moldings can be installed where the wall meets the floor, giving the room a finished touch.
Chair rails are moldings placed in the middle of a wall: “a very traditional method of breaking up walls, adding both interest and protection,” says the WMMPA. With the wooden molding at chair-back height, chairs are prevented from bumping or scuffing the wall.
Chair-rail moldings can also be used to separate two types of decorating material on the wall, such as paneling from wallpaper or paint. A classic paneling treatment in this case is wainscoting, in which the bottom half of a wall is paneled and the top half remains an empty canvas for paint or wallpaper. The wainscoting effect can also be achieved by connecting molding strips into rectangles along the bottom half of the wall.
Built-up moldings can be an excellent way to highlight or frame a fireplace or even to create an elaborate mantel.
Moldings can even be used to trim columns in entryways or staircase fittings.