Molding (decorative)  

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Moulding or molding (USA), also known as coving (UK, Australia) is a strip of material with various profiles used to cover transitions between surfaces or for decoration. It is traditionally made from solid milled wood or plaster but may be made from plastic or reformed wood. In classical architecture and sculpture, the moulding is often carved in marble or other stones.

A "sprung" moulding has beveled edges that allow mounting between two non-parallel planes (such as a wall and a ceiling). Other types of moulding are referred to as "plain".

Theory

At their simplest, mouldings are a means of applying light and dark shaded stripes to a structural objects without having to change the material or apply pigments. The contrast of dark and light areas gives definition to the object.

Imagine the vertical surface of a wall lit by sunlight at an angle of about 45 degrees above the wall. Adding a small overhanging horizontal moulding to the surface of the wall will introduce a dark horizontal shadow below the moulding, which in consequence is called a fillet moulding. Adding a vertical fillet to a horizontal surface will create a light vertical shadow. Graded shadows are possible by using mouldings in different shapes: the concave cavetto moulding produces a horizontal shadow that is darker at the top and lighter at the bottom; an ovolo (convex) moulding makes a shadow that is lighter at the top and darker at the bottom. Other varieties of concave moulding are the scotia and congé and other convex mouldings the echinus, the torus and the astragal.

Placing an ovolo directly above a cavetto forms a smooth 's' shaped curve with vertical ends that is called an ogee or cyma reversa moulding. Its shadow appears as a band light at the top and bottom but dark in the interior. Similarly, a cavetto above an ovolo forms an 's' with horizontal ends, called a cyma or cyma recta. Its shadow shows two dark bands with a light interior.

Together the basic elements and their variants form a decorative vocabulary that can be assembled and rearranged in endless combinations. This vocabulary is at the core of both Classical architecture and Gothic architecture.

Decorative mouldings have been made of wood, stone and cement. Recently mouldings made of Expanded Polystyrene (EPS) as a core with a cement-based protective coating have become popular. These mouldings have environmental, health and safety concerns that were investigated by Doroudiani et al.

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Unless indicated otherwise, the text in this article is either based on Wikipedia article "Molding (decorative)" or another language Wikipedia page thereof used under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License; or on research by Jahsonic and friends. See Art and Popular Culture's copyright notice.

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