SHIPLAP

September 20, 2017 Courtney Foster Shearer

Last week I shared how inheriting a 100+ year old bench kick-started our mudroom and today I'm excited to show you some progress! So, as a reminder - this is the space we were working with:

The door you see with the letter magnets is the entry door from the garage. The hallway, directly to the left as you come into the house leads you down to the Powder Room straight ahead, which is where all of the light is coming from in this photo, and the laundry room and hall closet on the right side. It's a decent sized space with a lot of doors and very little natural light basically screaming....MAKE ME A MUDROOM!

To get the ball rolling on this project we could think of only one element that would really start to set the tone for this space....SHIPLAP! We wanted to add some interest to the walls and nothing says interest + mudroom like shiplap so we jumped right in.

To begin we headed to our local Home Depot to peruse the wood options. We found they actually sell 6" high shiplap and while that was tempting we really wanted the individual planks to be taller. So we decided to make our own shiplap using 8" high primed 3/4" thick x 16' long pieces of wood.

To start we talked through how we wanted the ship lap to integrate with the existing crown moulding and baseboard. Brent cut a small piece so we could hold it up against the mouldings and we quickly decided to do away with the crown and just let the planks go all the way to the ceiling. This was necessary because the 3/4" piece of wood was deeper than the bottom of the crown which would of created a weird intersect. As for the baseboards - we decided to keep those in tact. For several reasons, but mainly because the depth of the plank against the baseboard wasn't an issue and we knew removing the baseboards would open a whole can of worms in terms of what do you do with the shoe mould that sits between the hardwood floors and the baseboards themselves? We didn't have an answer to that question, so we left well enough alone.

We started on the long wall, directly to the left when you enter through the garage. This was the longest wall so we knew there would be the least amount of cuts to do here. We started at the top of the wall because our ceilings are little over 8 feet high so we knew we would have one plank that was a bit shorter than the rest and we wanted that plank to be at the bottom.

For those unfamiliar with shiplap there is no set rule for spacing. You can make the gaps between the planks as big or as small as you want. We played with a few options and decided to leave a nickel space between our planks for a more classic look.

The process went something like this: We would measure the wall, Brent would cut the wood (when necessary) and bring it inside. Then, I would dab wood glue on the back and we would lift the plank into place and use nickels to achieve the gaps we were going for before Brent used his nail gun to secure the wood in place. We moved pretty fast and with every board that went up we got more and more excited as the space really started to come to life! We loved the look so much we decided to continue the ship lap on the perpendicular wall that leads to the stairs. It just felt right....

Obviously those mitered + angled cuts were not fun, but Brent and his big math loving brain figured it out and we are SO happy with the results. It sounds crazy but this shiplap has completely transformed this space. This hallway used to just kind of be there and now it literally demands attention. It feels interesting and alive and the cool part is THIS IS ONLY THE BEGINNING! We haven't even painted it yet! There are so many more layers to add, but for now let's all revel in the fact that stacked pieces of wood can take a space from zero to hero.

All photos are my own.