I bought a large house about six years ago because it had great potential. For me that equaled quality construction and tons of plain, white rooms. I have spent almost every waking moment (well, when I wasn’t at work) going room to room and completely re-doing each one. I have finished more rooms than this post allows pictures, but I posted a few of my favorites.
-
I added the pillars, arches, soffit, and curved ceiling to this sunroom. The ceiling has a soffit around its perimeter with raised panels. The ceiling arches up from the soffit, and then back down in the center where the chandelier hangs. I’ve never seen a ceiling quite like it, and figured I’d give it a try.
-
Here is a closeup of the center of the sunroom's ceiling. The carved moldings come together in the center at rather extreme angles, and the fact that they also curve made for some challenging compound cuts.
-
I bought the house in part because this room was perfect for my piano. Anyway, I hand-carved a few corbels for the ceiling and then built a mold to cast them in quantity. I also curved a piece of wood and built a mold to cast the remaining parts of the clover-leaves. I have a circular medallion with 4 acanthus leaves radiating out from it that I still need to install inside each clover leaf, but I haven’t made the mold for that yet. So many projects, so little time…
-
I installed this dome over the main staircase in the home. This involved building a structural “room” in the attic so that I could cut out roof trusses (yeah, a bit creepy… but I over-engineered the “room” and the dome has been there for 5 years now without so much as a crack, so I think I’m in the clear). I then built each of the 8 sections of the octagonal dome in my garage and lifted them into place with a pulley. I installed a rope light around the crown at the dome’s base and also under the oval medallion in the dome’s center, which lights the whole stairway with a very pleasant, warm glow. I also installed the balcony with French doors that let in a lot of natural light during the day.
-
This study was one of the first rooms I did in the home. I made several molds out of two part silicon and hand-cast all of the corbels (close to 100) out of plaster.
View Comments
Rob,
The sunroom is particularly impressive. Nice.
Your post appears to indicate that you are not a homebuilding professional. Is this the case?
Your work is impressive; the dome-like rounding of the ceiling in the sun-room with the table is interesting. I like the detail work on the archway as well. How high was the original ceiling on the dome with the crystal chandelier? What was the inspiration for the ceiling in the room with the piano?
Korbel - Thanks for your inspiring comment! No, I am not a home builder; working on my house is just a hobby for me. The original ceiling that I cut out for the dome was about 18' up. The dome arches to a peak that is around 25'. I built two temporary "floors", one about 10' up and one in the lip of the dome about 19' up so that I could reach the dome to do the finish trimming and painting. The ceiling in the piano room is somewhat similar to a ceiling I saw in a mansion in McLean, VA, but the design is my own.