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Rehab Diaries: DIY Beadboard Ceilings, Before and After

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Rehab Diaries: DIY Beadboard Ceilings, Before and After

August 1, 2017

For five years Emily Wright stared up her house’s “stomped stalactite ceilings” wishing they’d disappear. Then she came up with an inexpensive solution: DIY beadboard paneling that she and her husband, Shane Pribbel, were able to install themselves over the existing plasterwork.

Emily and Shane live in New Castle, Indiana, and she chronicles their home improvements in her blog Lifestyle and Design Online (currently on hiatus). “Most couples do normal things like go to dinner for quality time,” says Emily. “Not us. We rip apart our kitchen and start over.” Self-taught remodelers—”actually Shane did have a construction job one summer in high school,” says Emily—the two have jointly tackled all of the work in their house themselves, including adding new windows and a new roof (“yes, I actually got up on the roof,” she says) plus a gut renovation of the kitchen.

“We’re both attention-to-details people. We watch a lot of How-To videos on YouTube, then we jump right in.” The ceiling upgrade, Emily reports, was by far the most satisfying of their design solutions.

Photography via Lifestyle and Design Online.

After

for a long time, the couple couldn&#8\2\17;t figure out an obvious tack to  17
Above: For a long time, the couple couldn’t figure out an obvious tack to take with the ceilings: “We felt stuck with them because tearing them down or re-drywalling are both messy, painful tasks,” writes Emily in her blog. “We didn’t want to go through the trauma of all that work.”
 thinking about coffered ceilings put emily on the right track: &#8\2\ 18
Above: Thinking about coffered ceilings put Emily on the right track: “Our ceilings are only eight feet tall, so I knew a traditional coffered ceiling wouldn’t work, but I finally figured out that we could cover them with beadboard and trim to create a lightly coffered look.” The black pendant lamp is the Hektar Pendant Lamp from Ikea, $24.99.
the couple tackled one room at a time, including the ceiling in their newly ove 19
Above: The couple tackled one room at a time, including the ceiling in their newly overhauled kitchen.

They used four-by-eight-foot sheets of White/Satin Hardboard Panels from Lowe’s that cost $19.98 each. They nailed the premade beadboard directly in place—it holds well thanks to the fact that the existing plaster ceilings are backed with lath board. “Once the panels are up, the ceiling just needs to be trimmed out,” says Emily. For the trim they used one-by-four-foot MDF boards installed in a grid. “Some paint and several tubes of caulk later, and you have a coffered-looking ceiling.”

&#8\2\20;caulking and painting were by far the hardest part,&#8\2\2\1;  20
Above: “Caulking and painting were by far the hardest part,” reports Emily.

The walls, trim, and ceilings are painted in Valspar Ultra White from Lowe’s. The small dining area has extra chairs cleverly hung on the wall, and a DIY Lindsey Adelman light—have a look at our post, A New $60 DIY Lindsey Adelman Pendant, for a similar (but easier) project. 

the couple&#8\2\17;s black and white bedroom was where they first tested th 21
Above: The couple’s black and white bedroom was where they first tested the coffered ceiling idea.

Writes Emily in her blog: “Our bedroom is an 11-by-15-foot rectangle, so the layout was pretty simple: We needed six sheets of four-by-eight beadboard. Then we purchased enough MFD one-by-four boards do the trimming … we measured and used chalk lines to plan out the grid. Since we have a hanging light in the center of the room, we wanted a seam to run through the fixture. We liked the idea of the light being on the ‘beams’.” Read Emily’s full report on the ceiling project at Lifestyle and Design Online.

Before

&#8\2\20;i&#8\2\17;m not sure what the technical term for our ceilings  22
Above: “I’m not sure what the technical term for our ceilings is,” says Emily. “We referred to them as awful—just plain awful.”
&#8\2\20;on top of the texture, we had years of previous water damage and t 23
Above: “On top of the texture, we had years of previous water damage and terrible repair jobs to portions of the ceiling.”

Shown above is a section of the dining room that Emily describes as “really not so terrible in comparison to other spots that I wish I had photographed.”

N.B.: This post is an update; the original story ran on May 7, 2014.

Tackling your own place? See The Catskills Farmhouse of Two Brooklyn Creatives, Weekend DIY Edition for a similar beadboard-ceiling DIY. And read up on beadboard, V-groove, shiplap, and other paneling:

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Frequently asked questions

What is this article about?

This article is about the before and after transformation of a beadboard ceiling in a renovation project.

What is beadboard?

Beadboard is a type of wall paneling made of narrow, tongue-and-groove boards with a bead or decorative groove in between.

How was the beadboard ceiling installed?

The beadboard ceiling was installed by cutting the panels to size, then nailing them up with a pneumatic nail gun and finishing with trim pieces.

What other changes were made in the renovation project?

Other changes made in the renovation project included adding more windows, replacing flooring, and updating the electrical and lighting systems.

How long did the renovation project take?

The renovation project took approximately four months to complete.

What was the budget for the renovation project?

The budget for the renovation project was approximately $100,000.

What is the style of the renovated space?

The renovated space is designed in a farmhouse style with modern elements.

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