Color and embellishment can turn a vaulted ceiling into a dramatic, impactful statement in a room.
Bringing height to a room through a vaulted ceiling adds architectural interest. Often, homeowners bring color, texture and visual interest into a room's walls and furnishings. However, ceilings are commonly left the white-painted drywall that came standard with the home. Paint, embellishments and architectural treatments transform a plain ceiling into the cohesive topper to a finished room.
Creating Coziness
Sometimes a tall, vaulted ceiling makes a room feel too large or expansive for a family's taste. According to the iVillage website, color can help make a large space feel cozier. Paint a ceiling a rich, deep tone to help lower its visual impact and make the smaller. Choose a deep color like plum, burgundy, deep green or chocolate brown. Be sure to choose a color that is accented elsewhere in the room's design. It is important to paint the ceiling a color that is cohesive with the rest of the room's color scheme; otherwise, the ceiling appears jarring rather than cozy.
Causing an Impact
To create a grand statement, it is important to treat a vaulted ceiling as the icing to a room's cake, suggests the HGTV website. A patterned wallpaper, tin ceiling tiles or hand-painted mural turn a high ceiling into a room's most impactful statement. While many of these treatments will require professional installation, they are sure to make guests do a double take when entering a space. Wallpaper, murals and tin ceilings create a sense of opulence and grandeur. Complement a dramatic ceiling with formal furnishing and rich, elegant wall color.
Using Light
In a room with a vaulted ceiling, it is important to create many sources of light, according to the HGTV website. An expansive ceiling draws the eye upward and can make the rest of the room feel dark. Combine several sources of light in the room to help create visual interest, ground the ceiling with the space and provide ample light in the space. Suspend large pendant lights from the ceiling. To keep the room feeling light and airy, decorate the lights in neutral-colored shades. Add track lighting, as well as freestanding lamps. Create "task" lighting, where there is a light source for reading, working at a desk, playing games or other common tasks performed in the room.
Wooden Wonder
Wooden beams and planks can add a sense of natural beauty to an otherwise plain vaulted ceiling. The Ask the Builder website warns that adding wooden beams to a vaulted ceiling requires a significant amount of skill. For homeowners who do not possess carpentry skills, it may be best to have wooden beams professionally installed. Choose a rich, dark stain to help make a room seem smaller or a light finish to make a ceiling seem tall and a room feel airy. Wooden beams add architectural interest and will bring the eye up into the room. Wood also adds texture to a vaulted ceiling and helps the room turn into a focal point.
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