Victorian Skirting Boards

 

Skirting boards are one of the three joinery items found on walls in Victorian houses, the other being picture rails and dado rails. Skirting boards are the only wall joinery item to have survived to the present day. Originally skirting boards had three purposes in houses: to hide the inevitably messy bottom edge of plastered walls, to protect the plasterwork from damage by furniture and feet, and to hide evidence of rising damp in pre-damp-proof course houses.	By late Victorian times the third purpose had been made irrelevant by damp-proof course legislation, and in post-war times the first purpose had been made irrelevant in many properties by the advent of plasterboarded walls. Nevertheless, skirting boards are still universal. The Victorians generally used two types of design for their skirting, architraves, dado rails and picture rails - ogee and torus.	13.5 inch (34cm) skirting found in the rooms guests would see in 38 Fields Park Road
11 inch (28cm) skirting found in the rooms intended for family - slightly less grand than the rooms guests would see.	Ogee and Torus Ogee is an S profile, or a double curve with one being concave and the other convex. Many examples, though, have multiple curves rather than just two. The ogee design is Arabic in origin and was first used in cathedrals in the UK in the 14th century (you will find ogee stonework all over most gothic cathedrals). The torus (or torus ovulo) is a single convex curve. Both designs are readily	available in DIY stores today,although ogee designs are generally available for architraves, picture rails and dado rails rather than skirting boards. generally available for architraves, picture rails and dado rails rather than skirting boards. More surprisingly, even the most complex skirting design to be found in our house can be replicated to within a millimetre or two by buying and assembling various off-the-shelf boards and mouldings from a local DIY store (I know because I have done this where we lost some skirting to dry rot).
Skirting and Status The Victorians never passed up an opportunity to show status and hierarchy in their interiors, and skirting boards are no different. Rather than being simple plain boards with a simple profile as they are today, they became complex show-pieces. And, together with the plaster coving, were meant to give intimations of the classical decoration found, for example, at the top and bottom of Greek and Roman columns. In our house, there are four levels of skirting board hierarchy ranging from the over-the-top 13.5 inch (34cm) ogee-finished skirting board in the areas guests would see to the 7 inch (17cm) torus skirting in the servants areas (kitchen, loft rooms, etc.).	The third level of skirting - a 9 inch ogee/torus hybrid The largest and most elaborate skirting board is found in the hall and the two primary receptions rooms (top right above), where guests would see them. The slightly less tall and elaborate ogee skirting boards (11 inches as opposed to 13.5 inches) are to be found in the first floor landing, the main bedrooms	The bottom level of skirting - reserved for servants' areas only and the lesser reception room downstairs (left column above). A hybrid ogee/torus skirting is found in what would have originally been a children's bedroom or nursery (middle row immediately above). While simple torus skirting is found in the kitchen and scullery and the second floor bedrooms, all areas intended for the use of servants originally (immediately above, right).

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