How to install picture frame moulding(faux panel moulding)to add architectural detail to your walls.

Believe it or not, this picture frame moulding project was easier than I expected!  Quite opposite of most DIY projects. My foyer and hallway were in desperate need of some TLC. From the foyer all the way down the hallway I may have had three different paint colors and some 70’s wallpaper lingering.

This project has been on my mind for years.  I was waffling between shiplap(like my family room here) and panel moulding for soooo long.  I really prefer the look of panel moulding but the walls were so badly textured I figured the shiplap would be easier, since it would cover all that textured mess.  Plus, the shiplap would be significantly cheaper than the wood trim for panel moulding, and I feel like my house is so casual that the panel moulding would be too fancy/formal.

Well…my neighbor generously gave me a whole bundle of chair rail (he’s a contractor and about to sell his house).  About 40-16′ sticks!!!  It was enough to complete my whole project.  AND, he gave me a few sticks of picture moulding. In all, I only had to buy 32′ of picture moulding to complete this project…I only had to spend $40 total. I had the nails, caulk, paint and all the tools already.   God knew the desire of my heart…again. The first step was to mud and sand the walls to smooth out the previously applied Venetian plaster.  I conveniently had just enough mud leftover from another project.Then I applied painters tape to the wall to get a feel for the sizes of the boxes.  I ultimately decided to go with 3″-3.5″ spaces between my boxes and 4″ at the corners.  I thought it would be really difficult to determine the spacing but it wasn’t. I measured the width of my walls then subtracted the 3″ and 4″ spaces, and then divided the remainder by three, giving me the dimension for each of the three boxes.  On the walls where I made the middle box bigger I just adjusted those numbers around a little making sure that my total of three boxes was still the same total number.The spacing between the boxes has some wiggle room, the top and bottom(horizontal sticks) of the boxes really needs to be exact.  So I cut all my side pieces(vertical sticks) all at once from a jig.  The jig was just a piece of the trim moulding that I placed on top of the subsequent sticks to mark for my cuts. It made the process fast and easy. I didn’t have to measure every stick, I just marked from the jig. I used my handy dandy chop saw to make all the cuts. Fast, easy and accurate. I would highly recommend using a brad nail gun.  I used my air nailer and compressor. You could also use a battery or electric brad nailer. I wouldn’t do this project if I had to manually nail all this trim…maybe a much smaller project, but not a project of this scope. TIP:   I used 1 1/4″ brad nails…you definitely don’t want to use anything longer than this.  1 1/4″ is just long enough to go through the wood trim and into the drywall but not further.  This is very important because panel moulding is randomly nailed to the the walls…meaning not just on the studs.  So if your nails are longer than the wood trim and drywall thickness combined, you could accidentally  hit a pipe or an electrical cord in the wall. No Bueno.

Overall this panel moulding installation was pretty simple. The caulking and painting took forever.  I caulked every piece of moulding even though most of it was tight to the wall, it made the edges looks so much nicer painted.

The biggest impact is down the hallway. These long walls needed something and I really can’t hang art or pictures. Panel moulding is definitely the best solution. It adds interest and impact.