Wall decor. The function of walls

Wall decor

Walls are probably the most noticeable and important part of the interior.
When entering into the room one notices the color, kind and surface of the wall straight away, together they determine the psychophysiological atmosphere in the room. No wander that special attention is paid to walls in the interior of the house. We all want the walls of our house to be beautiful, cozy and safe no matter how differently we see the joinery of walls or what ideas we have about it.

From the earliest times man tried to implement in practice his need to create the decor of the interior of the living place: wall paintings in caves, frescos in Egyptian tombs, raised work on the walls and columns of temples, frescos in Antique houses, frescos and mosaic in Christian temples, raised work and sculptures in Roman and Gothic churches and that sort of things.

The function of walls, which is called in this article "intermission", that is a made-up word, is to create space where a person feels comfortable. A lot has been said about optical characteristics of walls, which are able to constrict and widen the space between them, to influence the illumination and give it a special kind of character. We were talking about walls as of an abstract thing, and its main parts were considered to be form and dimensions. Now it is time to talk about the thing which gives the real character to walls - their joinery.

"Start with walls" - this is the rule, which should be observed while decorating the house.
While thinking over the joinery of walls one should remember about the order of work: material - color - design; that means that the material for joinery should be chosen first, then the color and design. The availability of materials, which is offered by producers, is rather extensive; the most widespread materials have already been mentioned in "Materials for Household" chapter. It is important to choose the right material, which would correspond with the image that you would like your building to have.

The logical order of choosing should be based first of all on functional purpose of the building; its dimensions (big - small), to which part of the world it is oriented (cold - warm), the character of illumination (light - dark).

Definitely, the main principle of choosing the material for joinery can be the most mediocre: "cheap and nasty".

No doubt, even this principle can bring some good results, if it coincides with those numerous rules and peculiarities, which give optimal solutions.

If possible, natural materials which let in the air and have low temperature conductivity ("warm") should be chosen for bed-sits. These materials are wood, plaster, paper and textiles.

Materials with smooth and matt surface should be used for small living rooms. These materials are smooth wallpaper (not embossed), smooth plaster painted with glue-water color and panels from wooden materials painted with vanish or decorated with wood veneer from hardwoods which have badly-marked annual rings.

There should be light wallpaper, plaster painted in light color and the timber of the materials in dark rooms.

The coloring and structure of materials in small rooms should be self-colored: wallpaper should have reasonable and small wallpaper design, plaster should have pastel shades, the texture of wood materials should be small and tame, which is typical for some wood species.

These are the main rules which should be observed while choosing finishing material for walls. All the rest will depend on how colorful you want your walls and all the room to be.

If you want the interior to be a little bit rough then even wooden furring will do. The texture of branch timber of pine or fir is very suitable for a country house, for instance. A wall, one third of which is encased with wooden panels, will make the room look businesslike and official, which is very convenient for a study and practical for a nursery.

It is also possible to turn the walls inside out: use brick laying and the interior will have solidity and realism. It is important to remember though that the surface of wood, stone or brick is perceived in a family way when looked at closely and requires a large room.

Manufactured construction materials have a special role, they imitate the surface and form of wood or stone, they also imitate a construction of the wall, which is not common to it. The reference is to wallpaper, tile and sheeting, which imitate brick or stone laying, banded rustication of walls, marble or ceramic tile and so on. There are no particular objections against such a way of making the walls attractive, as if they were covered with wood or stone; and it is widely used as it is cheaper and even sometimes more practical than original materials. It is only important to make them look realistic so that they do not give away a badly made forgery from the first sight.

Avoid using cheap and unskillful forgeries which imitate stone, brick or wood - the walls are perceived as bad as the forged material.

If you want so much your walls to look like marble or brick try to find finishing materials which are able not only to imitate the texture of these materials artistically but also to imitate the surface of this texture. For example, there is ground paper wallpaper, sheeting and tile materials which really even by-touch imitate the surface of plaster, marble and brick. They are expensive, but of cause not as expensive as natural materials.

Walls covered with wood, stone, ceramics and textile

Walls covered with wood, stone, ceramics and textile are very expressive and informative.
Wallpaper "speaks' only with the help of the design on the wall, and that means that their main function is decorative one; on the other hand wood or stone, ceramics or plastic, metal or textile as cladding give information about the material they are made from, and as a result about their peculiar features.

Such informativeness is the main advantage and at the same time the main disadvantage of "constructive" cladding: it creates the effect of naturalness and safety of the walls, which is subconsciously perceived as a positive effect; but this effect on its turn makes the walls very noticeable and even sometimes annoying in rooms which have small area, and is psychologically not comfortable.

That is why joinery of walls with natural materials or their imitators should be preferably used in utility rooms and not in living rooms.

The smaller the elements of cladding are (slabs, rods tiles and so on) the more unquiet the wall looks as the joints reflect the light.

It is coursed by the fact that the elements of finishing material form joints, and the smaller the elements are the thicker the grid of these joints covers the wall. Any surface which does not have joints seams to be smoother than a surface with joints, even if they are performed in a decorative way. When a world famous designer was asked what wall seamed the most pleasant for him, he answered: "even, smooth and white".

People may have different opinions concerning these facts, but it has become popular world wide to follow the tendency to use plaster with the following painting them in light colors of pastel shades or light wallpaper with small nonintrusive design which does not have noticeable lines for living rooms. Such walls are considered to have neutral emotional influence on a person. And there is no point in arguing the fact that modern people who feel psychological pressure every day need to be surrounded by calm walls.

Though, the famous proverb "tastes differ" makes us continue this talk about possibilities, advantages and disadvantages of different kinds of joinery of walls. Walls covered with wood, colorful paper or textile wallpapered are much warmer than those covered with painted plaster, nothing to say about walls encased with stone or plastic materials. What is more, the way how finishing materials are made influences the visual perception of the dimensions of the room.

It is possible to diversify the design with the help of wooden rods or wallpaper with distinct linear-striped design. When the lines in the design are well seen then the walls may seem higher or have zigzag salience or vivid neutrality of the perception of their dimensions.

Variants of wall decoration

Variants of wall decoration :
- walls seem optically higher when they are decorated with vertical rods or vertically put wallpaper;
- walls seem lower than they are if they are belted with horizontal lines;
- herring-bone makes the walls look estranged and cold, that is why it should be of calm color shades;
- diagonal "hatching" with wooden rods shows the real dimensions of the walls and is very original in design.

Original design. Walls

Covering walls with wood gives a wide range of opportunities to vary forms and dimensions of elements, but walls covered with wood have a strongly marked character of the design color. That is why it can not be ignored while decorating and creating other elements of the interior (while decorating the floor and the ceiling, while furnishing the room and putting elements of decor into the interior).

While choosing variants for decoration one should bare in mind the factor of its durability. Expensive and time-consuming decoration from natural materials and their artificial imitations is supposed as a rule to serve for a long time, what is already positive. But on the other hand, the fact that we get used to a thing can lead to a situation when we are annoyed by the wall and then appears a firm desire to change "decorations"; but it will be not easy to do, and sometimes impossible, for some technical reasons.

What is more, the materials can simply get old and can be damaged as a result of careless exploitation or wrong handling. Holes must be drilled in such walls once and forever because it is almost impossible to seal them so that nothing is seen. The furnishing of the room should be appropriate, and changing the furniture can become a really difficult task. The joinery of the walls should not have a marked design or unusual color.

In this context wallpaper and colorful laying have a big advantage in comparison with long-lasting finishing materials, which are made from wood, stone or rigid plastic.

Many of you know the pleasant feeling of a new interior after the wallpaper has been changed or the walls have been repainted. However, the desire to change something is not close for everyone, and those who can not stand it will probably consider the argument about addiction shabby.

To achieve something out of the ordinary and vivid for the interior the walls of one room can be decorated with different wallpaper or different materials. For example, wall, door or window niches can be decorated with wallpaper of different design and color from the wallpaper of the room; or they can be painted in a different color than that of the rest of the room or a different material can be used for this purpose. It is important to observe the principle of harmony of the color and the facture of the material. The compatibility of color and design of two kinds of wallpaper must be checked before buying, by comparing unrolled wallpaper.

The most popular kinds of wallpaper are considered to be photo wallpaper and picture-wallpaper; it is a modern industrial implementation of ancient genre of mural fine arts.

Even in Middle Ages in Western Europe the walls of castles and palaces were decorated with huge tapestry - canvas carpets with weaved genre pictures. Designing walls with pictures showing landscapes on the whole surface of the wall was already used in medieval Far East. For instance, in reach houses of Japan and China a wall-picture used to be the only decoration in the room. Nowadays art paintings and tapestry in households with middle income are replaced with photo wallpaper and kit of wallpaper where different artworks are depicted; usually they are designed for a wall with certain dimensions.

If correctly used, photo wallpaper and picture-wallpaper can give the interior an unusual and original character. For instance, a landscape photo where a far horizon is depicted can cause an optical effect of the absence of the wall as if the house is situated somewhere in the wilds. Picture-wallpaper has a high degree of emotional influence. Needless to say that such kind of decoration is effective only in big rooms, as the illusion of presence in the landscape or in some other genre scene is reached (the same as in the cinema) with the help of distance between the wall and a person. In small rooms large elements of the picture on photo wallpaper and picture-wallpaper can cause only the effect of visual imminence of the wall and can irritate a person, who is bound to stay close to the picture-wall. Photo wallpaper should be placed on the wall which is situated opposite the window.

To create an atmosphere of comfort walls should not only be "dressed", but they also should be alive, and for that they must talk. Joinery is only a middle element in the art of interior; a word is also need with the help of which they will get their individual character, and that in its turn will illustrate the individual character of the owner of the house.