Tin ceilings present an interesting dilemma for any homeowner. Tin ceiling installation is well within the reach of most home handymen. All you have to do is install furring strips on your ceiling, make sure you plan your grid dead-on center, and then carefully nail the tiles in place. The result is a beautiful ceiling that hearkens back to the tin ceiling tile heyday of the early 1900s. The trick with tin ceiling installation lies more with design than construction. Because tin tiles come in an almost limitless array of designs, finding the right combination of tiles for your ceiling can be a daunting, sometimes prohibitive, task.
Tin Ceiling Basics
Before you undertake a tin ceiling installation, it's imperative that you school yourself on the different types of tiles and trims you're going to be working with. Here's a list to help get you off the ground, so that you sound like you know what you're talking about when you visit a supplier.
Panels are the actual tin ceiling tiles that make up the central design of your new tin ceiling. As mentioned before, they are available in an almost unlimited number of stamped designs and can be purchased with raw tin or painted finishes. The most decorative portion of your new ceiling will be composed of tin ceiling panels.
Filler refers to less ornate tiles that will serve as a border around your central design. Depending on the size of your ceiling, you might have one, two, or even three rows of filler tiles bordering your central panels.
Molding is thin, decorative, stamped tin that is installed between the panels and each border of filler tiles. It gives texture to the ceiling and makes for smooth transitions between tiles of differing designs.
Cornice is the molding that you'll install where the ceiling meets the wall in your tin ceiling installation. Like the rest of tin ceiling materials, it is ornately decorated, and provides your ceiling a smooth transition from the beautiful, stamped panels and filler tiles, down to the wall below. It is also valuable because it hides any gaps that exist between your tiles and the wall upon completion.
Design is Everything with Tin Ceiling Installation
Before you begin your installing your tin ceiling, the most important thing is to settle on a design. Create a diagram of your ceiling to scale, and carefully plan out the layout of your new ceiling as you envision it. The importance of this step cannot be overemphasized. It will help you to plan your design and will also give you a baseline for which materials to order and in what volumes. Since the design aspect of tin ceiling installation is by far the most challenging aspect of this project, many homeowners choose to shift to a professional at this stage in order to achieve the most stunning designs possible.
Installing Tiles
Once your tin ceiling has been planned out, the subsequent steps are fairly straightforward. Cover the ceiling in wood sheets (plywood is most popular) and then begin nailing in the tiles. If you're installing a ceiling medallion at the center of the ceiling, start there. If not, start at one end of the room and work over, saving the moldings and cornices for last. It's not an easy process, but it's not impossible, either. If you'd rather leave the dirty work to someone else, talk to a contractor experienced in tin ceiling installation about what you need to do to make your new tin ceiling a reality.
Matt Goering, formerly a carpenter and house painter, is a freelance writer for the home improvement industry who has published over 600 articles.
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