Picture Rail and the Quest for Fun(ctional) Walls

In working on the one open wall -the couch wall- in our basement library, I decided to add my favorite piece of millwork to the wall: picture rail. Not to be confused with a picture ledge, this sits at the top of the wall or below the crown with a small gap to provide a spot for hooks that hold artwork without tampering with the wall itself. It's fantastic for flexibility, and saves the wall from hanging holes.

My functional brain loves this molding: the purpose in its use makes it a perfect fit for our house, even if I had to get some custom milled. The folks with the knives for what I ordered were on Etsy, and they are identical to the original picture rail in our living and dining room.

We’ve used the original picture rail in our dining and living room as soon as we learned what it is! Our dining room has some large-format artwork with the wheel of the year, and ever-rotating artwork from the kids. It’s an easy way to hang garlands and balloon arches for holidays and birthdays…
And when it’s freezing we hang extra curtains around leaky windows and doors.

Its origins really were a once-common-now-forgotten solution to hanging artwork on plaster walls.  Install it once, and infinite possibilities prevail.

Felt

While I’m adding picture rail to our walls -both drywall and plaster- in our house, in the basement library, I always planned to add another element of fun and function.  Shelves are everywhere in this room, and when I found that Felt Right made a chess and checker board complete with game pieces… I couldn’t help myself!  Even if it largely renders the picture rail obsolete in this area (for pictures, anyway: it’s still great for trimming this part of the wall), I love our ability to add some playfulness to this room.

Its positive effects on sound-dampening are extremely helpful as well.  Since this wall is shared with a bedroom, I wanted to help contain sounds from movies and late-night TV within the library, and keep the house-noise lower when the room is being used for relaxation and sleepovers.

One thing always seems to lead to another over here though… and the positive effects that felting this small section of wall has had is already quite noticeable.  So, in trying to find the *one perfect solution* for our attic ceilings, we’re leaning this way for upstairs too.  The ceilings are low, and the idea of hitting heads on a felt surface is a better idea than any we’ve had so far.  And there is something to be said about a lightweight felt.

There is definitely something appealing about remaining in the planning stage with the attic, but eventually, I need to finalize some of these decisions.