Wainscot or wainscoting is wooden or other panelling applied to the lower 1.2 to 1.5 m of an interior wall, below the dado rail or chair rail and above the skirting board or baseboard. It is traditionally constructed from tongue-and-groove boards, though beadboard or decorative panels (such as a wooden door might have) are also common. Wainscoting may also refer to other materials used in a similar fashion.
Its original purpose was to cover the lower part of walls which, in houses constructed with poor or nonexistent damp-proof courses, are often affected by rising damp. In countries whose building regulations insist on adequate damp-proofing, its purpose is now generally decorative.
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In the days before paint was scrubbable and wallpaper was mass-produced, wainscoted walls served a practical purpose; covering the lowest and most vulnerable portion of a wall. Covering with wood panelling provided an attractive and decorative wall treatment tough enough to withstand cleaning and resist any damages due to everyday use.
Even with today’s modern paint and wallpapers, wainscoting still serves its intended protective purpose; however people use it most often because of the way it transforms a bland space into an elegant room by adding interesting detail to walls that don’t otherwise have any built-in character.
Sure, that all sounds reasonable until you start to consider the cost. Until recently the trouble was, if you wanted wainscoting you either had to make-do by faking the look with trim applied directly to the wall or spend alot of money on a custom carpenter and custom-shaped panels. Now with high speed production tecniques and modern, precision made MDF products, Elite Mouldings makes installing your own wainscoting a more viable option.
We offer several types of wainscoting, whether you are a do-it-yourselfer, a contractor, builder or you have a carpenter to do the job for you, our pre-manufactured kits save time and money on the job site and come with detailed instructions.
When choosing, you should consider which wainscoting is appropriate for your application. Each Elite Wainscoting System can be used for different purposes without breaking the bank or skimping on decorative appeal. Keep in mind that we have experienced personnel standing by to answer any questions that you may have, just a phone call away.
Elite Wall Paneled Wainscot — an Elite Moulding exclusive, what we consider to be the best value on the net. It goes together very easily and comes pre-routed and sold in 8 foot kits for easy installation. Although it is the least expensive of the three it looks great in any situation. It comes in either a 36″ or 42″ finished height for rooms with either 8 or 9 foot ceiling heights but can be installed higher. It installs right over the existing wall board using the wall as the middle panel. You can also use it to cover any damaged walls by first installing a thin flat piece of wood or MDF to the height of the wainscot, on the wall before installing the Wall Paneled Wainscot system over it.
Also referred to as Cape code or Cottage Style we offer Elite Flat Panel Wainscot. It’s priced between the Raised Panel Wainscot and the Wall Paneled Wainscot. Not only does this wainscot style look great but it can also be used to cover up damaged, unfinished, or textured walls. It is very similar to the raised panel wainscot except that it doesn’t use a raised, shaped panel. Instead it uses a thin flat piece of wood which fills in the gap that the panel would usually take. The Elite Flat Paneled Wainscot is less expensive than the Raised Panel System and easier to install because the panels are thin and they do not require shaping or routering.
The Elite Raised Panel Wainscot is a formal look typically seen in century homes. Where the flat paneled system uses a 1/8″ “flat” panel, this system uses as “raised” 1/2″ panel like you would normally see in fine cabinetry or embossed in many of the interior doors sold today. Unlike other pre-fabricated or embossed systems, ours can be customized to suit any wall. Elite Mouldings offers the only fully customizable Raised Panel Wainscot system in the industry. Until now, this type of wainscoting has been prohibitively expensive and could only be installed by a custom carpenter. Using modern manufacturing methods we have dramatically reduced the cost and intensive labour normally associated with this type of wainscoting.
To complete our wainscot line up, we also offer Beadboard and Applique (picture frame) systems. They are sold in well packed, easy to install, 8 foot kits.
