How to choose the right picture rail to suit your walls

With so many picture rails available, how can users determine which types are correct for use in different situations? The truth is there are many things to consider when installing picture rail, this is due to an unlimited amount of variables that only years of experience can assist with and the end result of hanging your favourite shouldn’t be a compromise. But if  during the finishing process of every build there will be common solutions for dressing the walls at both the top and bottom, everyone will be familiar with skirting-board at the bottom of the wall, but the 3 most popular solutions for joining the wall to the ceiling are:

1. Cornice – This can be a traditional plaster decorative cornice, a smooth curved cornice, a simple wooden moulding or more recently a polyurethane moulding. The main function of a cornice is to create a perposful junction between the wall and ceiling.
2. Square-set – Usually a more modern approach to junctioning a wall to a ceiling and made possible with more readily available, predictable modern materials is to use a Square-set ceiling which basically means a plasterer has seemlessly joined the wall to the ceiling with no visible cover-strip.
3. P60 shadowline – Sometimes also referred to as P50 but with a minimal difference between the two. The P60 shadowline is a pre formed (usually steel) moulding which is again plastered in much the same way as a square-set ceiling but the finished product has an even 10mm recess around the perimeter of the room at the junction where the wall meets the ceiling.

See also: Which picture rail should I use and where?