Which skirting boards are best?

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If you&#;ve been following us for a while, you&#;ll know that we&#;re big fans of original period features. We love our high rooms, the 100+ year old squeaky parquet and our fancy plastered ceilings.

They&#;re the reason we fell in love with our current home and they&#;re the reason we purchased our last house, too.

Over the last years, we&#;ve made an effort to restore and reinstate as many of these original features as possible. It&#;s not always easy or cheap but it&#;s always so worth it for the end result!

As much as we love fancy stained glass, original tiles and cast iron fireplaces one thing that often gets overlooked are the architectural details like architraves and skirting boards.

We were lucky to still have most of the original skirting boards in our last home (although they took forever to strip, sand and paint) but we&#;re not so lucky in our current home. All of our skirting boards are MDF.

Now, if you&#;re thinking &#;They&#;re fine, woman &#; what are you on about?!&#; take a look at this&#;.

Yup, this is what they look like almost everywhere! The problem with the MDF skirting is that it&#;s so susceptible to damage.

Admittedly, most of the scuffs and marks you see here happened when we sanded our floors but they are so much more sensitive than the solid timber ones we had in our last house.

So, what should you consider when choosing skirting boards?

Scale And Proportion.

Take the size of your room into consideration when choosing skirting boards &#; if you have high ceilings you should opt for taller skirting boards. Equally, if you have low ceilings, you should avoid tall skirting boards as any horizontal lines will visually shorten your room.

You can even alter the perceived proportions of a room just by adjusting the height of the architectural details like skirting boards or dado rails.

As a very general rule, you should opt for skirting boards that are roughly 1/18 of the height of your room or choose skirting boards that are as tall as roughly double the width of your door architraves.

Design.

Something else to consider is the style of your skirting boards. They can be a decorative element of your design and it&#;s important not to underestimate how much skirting boards can influence the feel and look of your room!

When choosing the right skirting boards for your home, take the age and architectural style of the building into consideration.

If you live in a Georgian house with high ceilings you&#;re not going to want to install Edwardian skirting boards and if you live in a modern new-build, Victorian skirting would probably look really out of place, too!

Material.

As I mentioned above, MDF skirting boards are much more susceptible to warping, chips and cracks but there&#;s no denying that they are a very budget-friendly option.

If you can afford to, we&#;d always recommend opting for more high-quality materials as they&#;ll look better, last longer and still won&#;t break the bank (at least when it comes to skirting boards and architraves!).

Sourcing period mouldings, architraves and skirting boards can be difficult (trust me, I&#;ve been there!) which is why it&#;s always great to come across a company like Period Mouldings.

They not only offer a huge selection of high-quality products in a range of wood types, sizes and finishes but also offers a bespoke option where they&#;ll match any moulding to a sample you provide!

Photo: Period Mouldings

Best of all, you can order all of your period mouldings and skirtings online and they&#;re delivered right to your door. If only I&#;d known about them when I was trying to get our architraves matched!

Period Mouldings don&#;t just do period skirting boards. They also make architraves, pictures rails, panel and ceiling moulds and even period doors so they&#;re well worth bearing in mind if you live in a period property and have some upgrading and updating to do!

Whoever installed the skirting boards in our home obviously hadn&#;t heard of Period Mouldings and they didn&#;t put much thought into the design, style or longevity aspect of our skirting boards (they apparently wanted to lay laminate flooring over the parquet!).

We would love to replace all of our skirting boards in our apartment but they&#;re all fairly new and, as we&#;re never ones for ripping out things that are in a generally okay condition, we&#;ve given the skirting in our living room a bit of an upgrade.

Notice a difference?

Yep, we pimped our skirting!

Now, this obviously isn&#;t quite the same as having lovely timber skirting boards but at least it&#;s slightly more in proportion to the rest of the room!

It was actually a really easy and fairly quick project to do. As usual, emptying the room took longer than the project itself!

All we did was nail (or glue where we thought there may be a pipe or cable) the strip of timber to the wall. Then we caulked any joints and nail holes before painting everything white. I love the bit of extra detail it adds but the biggest difference is obviously how much cleaner and tidier it all looks.

Colour.

I personally like white woodwork and we painted all of our skirting boards, architraves and dado rails in our last home white.

In our current home, we&#;ve decided to mix things up a bit. In our bedroom, we opted to paint the skirting boards the same colour as the walls!

We were admittedly a bit hesitant about this but we absolutely love how it turned out and it gives the room a much more contemporary feel.

For us, the huge amount of design choices you have is one of the biggest reasons to choose natural wood skirting boards. If you have natural timber, you can, of course, still paint it but you also have the option of oiling or varnishing the skirting boards to keep the lovely natural timber visible.

If you want to learn more, please visit our website Bulk Coloured PVC Skirting Boards Manufacturer.

So, embrace the architectural details and don&#;t just treat them as an afterthought. If you can afford to, opt for solid timber skirting boards which are definitely an investment worth making!

Do you love architectural details and original features as much as we do? What lengths have you gone to in order to restore or reinstate original features? What would your ideal skirting board look like?

Skirting boards are essential in most homes. Whether they are to finish the junction where floor and wall meet, or whether you want to add your personal style stamp onto the home with decorative boards, they are that little element we see in all homes today.

Skirting boards are a relatively small percentage of the total expense during a new build or renovation but are a high impact and increase the value of a home for a larger return on investment. We see customers spending at most approximately 1.2% of total project construction costs on timber mouldings, but for that investment, increasing the total property value by up to 30%.

When you invest your time and hard-earned dollars into your build or reno, you not only want to add value but want to make sure the products you&#;re choosing last &#; skirting boards are no exception. The humble skirting board tends to take a beating, especially in high-traffic areas. Whether it be from the vacuum and mop, foot traffic, pets or children&#;s toys using them as a stop break, the risk of damage to skirting boards is relatively high. This is why it is critical to choose the best material for your skirting boards, so you don&#;t have to patch marks or re-install new ones due to the use of poor materials.

Of course, we LOVE skirting boards and want to help you choose the best materials to get the most out of your skirting boards now and well into the future. Not only is choosing the right profile important to match the style of your home and add to the beauty of the interior but what they are made from matters too.

There are three main choices for timber skirting boards, Medium-Density Fibreboard (MDF), Finger-Jointed Pine (FJ Pine) and Hardwood Timber (such as Victorian Ash, Tasmanian Oak, Spotted Gum), and we discuss their pros and cons below.

Medium-Density Fibreboard (MDF)

MDF is a combination of sawdust, wood shavings, small wood chips and resin, which have been compacted together to make the lengths suitable for skirting boards and other timber mouldings.

Pros

Cons

Can be cheaper than real timber Can be less durable throughout the years and need replacing sooner &#; costing you more in the end The face of MDF is strong &#; VERY strong. When impacted it can compress the board causing a dent. As it is not timber, these cannot be sanded and repaired in the same way, so will usually require replacement of that section Is manmade so naturally smooth with a perfectly flat finish and is quite strong Can be tricky to install as it is so hard and smooth, nails and screws don&#;t always &#;grab&#; so we recommend using an adhesive with installation as well (more cost) Our MDF is one of the safest on the market, but as it is a man-made product, it still comes with some risks. MDF is known for its toxicity, particularly during installation when the dust is created. You must be very careful and protect yourself. The edges of MDF are not as strong as the rest of the product which makes it prone to splitting and chipping at joints and edges. Can only be painted. Not suitable for staining Our biggest criticism of MDF is its ability to swell when it comes into contact with moisture, and this can happen slowly over time, especially in wet areas where it might be exposed to dampness from a mop or steam cleaning Is very heavy to handle for installation

When looking at the significance of water absorption on MDF, we did a test to show you the impacts moisture has on MDF. We can conclude we were shocked by the outcome. MDF absorbed water much faster than we thought and this happened in just 24 hours!

Although your floors will not come into contact with the amount of water we used in the test, over time from mopping and even spilling liquid, moisture will end up between your skirting board and flooring impacting the skirting boards. To overcome this, painting can protect the MD skirting and reduce water absorption, so it is essential to paint the whole skirting board &#; not just the visible parts. The moral to the story&#; have your MDF mouldings primed if that&#;s the material you choose to use.

Finger-Jointed Pine (FJ Pine)

Finger-Jointed Pine (FJ Pine) is a solid pine timber, meaning it is REAL timber. The length for the skirting board is created using individual pieces, which come together with the interlocking (or fingers) to create longer lengths. A zig-zag is created in the join, which eliminates knotting in the process.

Pros

Cons

It is REAL timber &#; natural and beautiful There can be evidence of the timber in its natural states such as gum veins and knots, but these can be puttied over when nail holes are being filled to give a flawless look Less expensive than solid timber Slightly more expensive than MDF Has more longevity than MDF, so will need replacing less Is softer than MDF so can be more susceptible to marks and scratches As it is timber, marks and scratches can be repaired and sanded out Much lighter than MDF to handle during installation, and less prone to twisting and warping. As it is real timber, the nails hold well for installation Our FJ Pine is FSC certified, meaning it knows it hasn&#;t had any negative impacts on forests, people or wildlife. Buying FSC FJ Pine will assure no deforestation occurred, which promotes sustainability. As it is a natural product, there are no health risks like MDF during installation. A Planet Ark study &#;Wood Housing, Health Humanity&#; found that wood products in a room improved indoor air quality and improved a person&#;s emotional state and self-expression.

Natural is always the best option, and if you are looking for REAL timber, FJ Pine is the most sustainable and economical option.

Hardwood

If you&#;re looking for a traditional feel with stained or raw timber skirting, then hardwood is the top choice. Durable and beautiful, this is the timber you would use when you want to showcase a natural look and let the timber take centre stage.

Pros

Cons

You can stain and lacquer the timber showcasing its features and leaving it in a natural state It is expensive&#; You get the benefit of working with real timber and all the positive aspects that come with installing it Supply is sometimes limited and can take some time to source It is hard-wearing and will outlast MDF and FJ pine Lengths are determined by the availability of timber so can require more joins and time to install Is moisture resistant by nature

What next?

Now you know the pros and cons of each material we can manufacture skirting boards from and what they can do for your home, you can make an informed decision on what works best for you and your situation.

What do we recommend? It will always be FJ Pine. It is sustainable, impacts the environment much less and will last longer over the journey of your skirting boards. You will get greater longevity and &#;bang for your buck&#; from FJ Pine over the long term.

If you have more questions about the material for your skirting boards, please get in touch with us.

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