Picture Rail Molding, Picture Hanging, Home Art Gallery

long wall of room with picture rail moldings installed and paintings hung

Mr has given me something I have requested for decades. In our "lifetime" house, we just never got around to doing it. Here, it became precedent because of limited wall space. Voila, done! Picture rail molding...instant gallery picture hanging. Well, instant is overstating it. Installing the molding is the first step, hanging the art work is another story. I'll talk about the molding first.

picture rail molding inclusive of window moldings

We have purchased and added picture rail molding to the top section of the living room walls. A section of the molding is pictured below left. The purpose of the molding was primarily for hanging paintings.  The extra added value is that it works as trim in the boring farmhouse interior, and it looks great. The trim looks finished, classic, and adds great detail to the room. It is installed about 10 inches below the ceiling line and creates a nice emphasis on the high 9' ceilings in the room.  It also lines up with the trim around the windows, so it creates a bridge between the windows, tying them together into one unit visually.

Our trip to installation began with our attempts to purchase picture rail molding. It appeared to be impossible. We tried Lowes, then Home Depot, then the internet. Nothing was working out. We stopped into 84 Lumber because we were in the neighborhood looking for windows. It occurred to me that they might have the picture rail, so I asked while there. They gave me a negative answer and told me that they never heard of it. Before we left we glanced down to the molding chart on the countertop and we noticed it there on their molding chart. We pointed it out to them. They looked up the price on the computer and we were in business. The cost was very reasonable, something less than $.80 a foot, making the project under $200 to complete in two rooms. We decided it was a great look,for a good price, so we proceeded to order the moldings. After a one week wait, the supplies arrived and the project began.

Because the house is 140 years old, the wall and floor surfaces are not consistently level throughout the different areas of the walls and floors.  Nothing is level... nor square.  A level installation was a daunting challenge.  The  installation had to incorporate visual evaluation of what looked right. It could not just be based on what the level tool read as being level. Once we looked at the molding in the location it told us to install to, we could see that it was rather crooked. A better way had to be found. A laser level was employed for a level installation, and even that was foiled by the one hundred and forty year old house.

picture rail molding with art work

Eventually a combination of both installation techniques were employed for the final placement of the moldings. Some of it was done with the level and other parts had to be done by eye to make it match and appear level.  The first wall had to be completely installed by a visual method. The next two walls were able to be installed with the level, and the fourth wall was level at one end and then visually matched at the other molding end next to it. This project took a lot of patience and thought. What we thought would be a quick installation, took several days. In the end it did get completed. Below are photos of the completed rail, with a few pictures on it.

Hanging the pictures and obtaining hooks to use on the rail, also took some dedication. I will cover those aspects of this project in the next posting or two.

Design choices note: Some folks choose to paint the area between the picture rail molding and the ceiling the same color as the ceiling. In this case it would be painted white to match the molding and the ceiling. When done this can give the room the appearance of crown molding or a tray ceiling. It can also create the illusion of high ceilings in a room without then, or emphasize authentic high ceilings.