You might remember in discussing the design of the dining room, I talked about adding architectural features to the room. It’s something that I knew would make a huge difference to the space and I couldn’t wait to see how my relatively plain room would be transformed.

Well, when The Skirting Board Shop got in touch to see if they can help me out with the project, I couldn’t say yes fast enough. While they don’t provide the thin moulding for the panels we’ll be creating, they do supply all manner of different skirting boards (of course) as well as dado rails (chair rails) and architrave – all of which I would be needing! The wonderful thing about The Skirting Board Shop is that they offer a huge choice. They carry lots of different profiles for lots of different styles of property from contemporary and Art Deco to period-inspired profiles that work perfectly in older properties like my own.

They also allow you to choose from a range of different finishes including white primed, various oak finishes as well as mahogany, American Black Walnut and rosewood.

Now, before I get to what we ended up choosing, I do want to mention that while we did have the original skirting board in this room for the most part, there were areas where it was missing. Booooo. So, for instance, on the chimney breast, the skirting board went around the sides and then just inexplicably stopped and it was just filled where it met the front of the breast – which really looked awful.

We also needed it in the opening to the kitchen, which would have been a later configuration to this style of property. Originally there would have been a single door leading from the dining room into the kitchen but at some point in (recent) history, the owners made the smart move to open the two rooms up with a much larger open doorway, making it a much more sociable space. However, they weren’t so smart to realise there really should have been skirting board INSIDE the opening and they never bothered at all with architrave. And plus, there was never skirting board put in the kitchen at all. You can see what the opening looked like here:

And so, we felt it was our duty to this house to restore some of what should have always been there or at least create a space where the more modern changes made to the house were carried out more sensitively to the existing architecture when it was built.

Because the house was built in 1906, it’s actually Edwardian but the Edwardian period really only lasted for about a decade while Victorian architecture (named after Queen Victoria who reigned for more than 70 years) would have lasted for about half a century, a style that became more defined towards the end of her reign. So for the most part, the house borrows a lot of architectural features that Victorian properties would have had. As it would have been quite costly to try to match the existing skirting boards properly (and sadly, the largest one ended up cracking right down the middle when we removed it), we decide to replace them all with something that looked very close to what was here originally.

Ultimately, we chose the Victorian profile skirting boards, Victorian profile architrave and the company’s dado rail profile which married well to the existing features we already have in the house.

I measured around the room and re-checked my measurements and then I placed my order. Within a few days, I got a phone call from The Skirting Board Shop to arrange for delivery. I thought that was important to note as these things come in 4 metre lengths, you really need to be in to take them! So within the week, we had our delivery so we decided to tackle that this weekend as you can see from the pictures!

It took us all day Saturday to cut the skirting board but that’s mostly due to the fact that our mitre saw isn’t really big enough to handle the really wide cuts that were required so we started the cut on the mitre saw and then finished it with the circular saw plus there were a few tricky areas around that we needed to even out the (very uneven) walls and such so it all just took quite a lot of time. Old houses always have their challenges!

On Sunday, we tackled the dado rail and architrave which took barely any time at all – it was all done within a matter of a couple of hours! So quick and satisfying!

It all still needs to be filled and painted but goodness, what a difference it makes to the room!

Plus, I’d ordered enough architrave to go around the doorway on the kitchen side and we even had enough skirting board left over to add that in the kitchen too.

I adore the kitchen side – it’s made SUCH a huge difference to the space and really just finishes off the doorway so well – something that’s been bothering me since we moved in 5 1/2 years ago! Oh my god the satisfaction of seeing that up… there are just no words.

The dado rails and architraves were installed using EvoStik Gripfill Gap Filling Adhesive* and as everything we got from The Skirting Board Shop was primed MDF, it was all really easy to cut and install. The skirting boards need to be fixed with both the gap filling adhesive as well as screws to the walls (we’d only had enough time to cut them this weekend) and we still need to fill absolutely everything (it’s an old house, nothing is actually square which makes this work a little more challenging) but once that’s done, it’s ready to be painted.

Of course, we still need to put all the trimwork up so that needs to happen before painting but at least we’re making progress! As I mentioned in my last post, I received my gorgeous vintage sideboard and I’ll be picking up the chairs this week (so excited but no idea where we’re going to put them as the house is rapidly getting very full) so hopefully I can share those with you soon!

Sorry for the lack of pretty pictures in this post but well, such is the way with a remodel! Huge thanks to The Skirting Board Shop for what we were able to accomplish so far – it’s made a huge difference and I’m so pleased with the quality of what we received. Absolutely happy to recommend them for your next project so do check them out!

What do you think of the changes so far?

*Disclaimer: I received skirting board, dado rails and architrave from The Skirting Board Shop free in exchange for my review but as always, all words, images and opinions are my own. I only work with companies I really like and think you’ll like too! Thanks for supporting the businesses that support Swoon Worthy!