Hiding a wooden beam
Discussion
Having now done all of the main rooms in our house, focus has turned to the extremely grim kitchen. I'll be ripping everything out (the floor tiles are particularly horrible and seem to have been designed to look dirty!) but one piece I'm struggling with is what to do with the wooden beam that bridges the ceiling to the left of the door (currently painted white in the picture).
I assume that these were originally two rooms and at some point the wall has been removed - unfortunately it just doesn't really work as a space.
What I'd like to do is box in the beam (bringing the boxing down to the height of the doorway) and possibly extend out the wall where the door is by 50cm or so to provide a bit of "zoning."
The issue that I have is that the beam has been mounted flush with the wall (where the doorway is) so if I were to box it in, I'd have a plasterboard thick edge sitting proud of the wall where they meet.
One option is to overboard the wall where the door is as well but I'm wondering if there is an easier or more convenient way to do it? I'm open to suggestions
Original Room (ignore all the crap - we're using it as a bit of a dumping room at the moment)
Google Gemini suggestion of how to make it less crap (although it has taken a few liberties!)
I assume that these were originally two rooms and at some point the wall has been removed - unfortunately it just doesn't really work as a space.
What I'd like to do is box in the beam (bringing the boxing down to the height of the doorway) and possibly extend out the wall where the door is by 50cm or so to provide a bit of "zoning."
The issue that I have is that the beam has been mounted flush with the wall (where the doorway is) so if I were to box it in, I'd have a plasterboard thick edge sitting proud of the wall where they meet.
One option is to overboard the wall where the door is as well but I'm wondering if there is an easier or more convenient way to do it? I'm open to suggestions
Original Room (ignore all the crap - we're using it as a bit of a dumping room at the moment)
Google Gemini suggestion of how to make it less crap (although it has taken a few liberties!)
Edited by LennyM1984 on Thursday 30th October 12:17
If you were to go down the route of the vertical timbers created by the lovely Google chap then I would strip back the beam above and see if you can finish them all to the same colour/finish.
If you overboard by the door you will need to plant on timber to increase the door frame or you will make the architrave flush/recessed to the wall.
If you overboard by the door you will need to plant on timber to increase the door frame or you will make the architrave flush/recessed to the wall.
Where the door is can you push that wall all the way back to the door on the right in the hallway? Then perhaps have a look at the beam itself - could perhaps a smaller one be put in its place (structural calcs notwithstanding, obviously)? As you say it looks likes two rooms knocked into one so one of the doors could go at least, or maybe even both doors (and the walls they're in) and have it properly open plan.
JuanCarlosFandango said:
How thick is the beam? Couldn't you fix timber underneath and make it flush?
The beam is around 10" wide so I can easily build a stud wall frame below it - the issue is that because the edge of the beam is flush with the wall, I am going to have a 9mm edge sitting proud of the original wall. That is the bit I am struggling to solve. I might just overboard the lot and redo the door frame.May I suggest an alternative approach? The problem there looks like simply a "job half done".
Paint the side of that beam wall colour instead of white and it will disappear. You could go a bit further and put some triangular pieces in the two top corners.
The more fundamental issue is two different floors and a kitchen that's a sea of beige, brown and beige. A single type of floor running all the way through would pull that together enormously. And getting some chrome knobs on the cupboards would help despatch the beigeness. Better still get to grips with the whole colour scheme.
The lighting looks somewhat severe. Any under cupboard lights? Any thoughts about different ceiling lights?
If it ain't broke don't fix it. But if it is broke, fix it properly.
Paint the side of that beam wall colour instead of white and it will disappear. You could go a bit further and put some triangular pieces in the two top corners.
The more fundamental issue is two different floors and a kitchen that's a sea of beige, brown and beige. A single type of floor running all the way through would pull that together enormously. And getting some chrome knobs on the cupboards would help despatch the beigeness. Better still get to grips with the whole colour scheme.
The lighting looks somewhat severe. Any under cupboard lights? Any thoughts about different ceiling lights?
If it ain't broke don't fix it. But if it is broke, fix it properly.
Panamax said:
May I suggest an alternative approach? The problem there looks like simply a "job half done".
Paint the side of that beam wall colour instead of white and it will disappear.
The more fundamental issue is two different floors and a kitchen that's a sea of beige, brown and beige. A single type of floor running all the way through would pull that together enormously. And getting some chrome knobs on the cupboards would help despatch the beigeness. Better still get to grips with the whole colour scheme.
The lighting looks somewhat severe. Any under cupboard lights? Any thoughts about different ceiling lights?
If it ain't broke don't fix it. But if it is broke, fix it properly.
The entire kitchen, floors, cupboards, lights etc are being ripped out (they are a thoroughly awful homage to the 1980s) - I just need to sort the "structure" out first.Paint the side of that beam wall colour instead of white and it will disappear.
The more fundamental issue is two different floors and a kitchen that's a sea of beige, brown and beige. A single type of floor running all the way through would pull that together enormously. And getting some chrome knobs on the cupboards would help despatch the beigeness. Better still get to grips with the whole colour scheme.
The lighting looks somewhat severe. Any under cupboard lights? Any thoughts about different ceiling lights?
If it ain't broke don't fix it. But if it is broke, fix it properly.
The tiles are worthy of their own mention as they really are particularly awful. When we first viewed the house, I had assumed that they were just grimy (it was a probate sale) but it turns out that that's actually the design. Like Artex and textured wallpaper (2 things I have spent a lot of time/money removing this year) I simply cannot imagine how anybody at any point in time could have thought that these tiles looked good.
Obviously we bought the house with plans to renovate it all so it wasn't a huge concern but even so, they really are miserable
LennyM1984 said:
Obviously we bought the house with plans to renovate it all so it wasn't a huge concern but even so, they really are miserable.
Did the same myself some years back. Just bodge things up as best you can at small cost and get ready for the "real job" in a few years time.In my situation we had brown tiled floor, beige cupboards, beige surfaces, beige tiles, brown pine ceiling, one brown pine wall. First step was changing the ceiling/wall and painting the cupboards a brighter colour, changing the handles and changing the lighting. Lived like that for a decade before finally ripping out the whole lot and doing it properly.
LennyM1984 said:
The entire kitchen, floors, cupboards, lights etc are being ripped out (they are a thoroughly awful homage to the 1980s) - I just need to sort the "structure" out first.
The tiles are worthy of their own mention as they really are particularly awful. When we first viewed the house, I had assumed that they were just grimy (it was a probate sale) but it turns out that that's actually the design. Like Artex and textured wallpaper (2 things I have spent a lot of time/money removing this year) I simply cannot imagine how anybody at any point in time could have thought that these tiles looked good.
Obviously we bought the house with plans to renovate it all so it wasn't a huge concern but even so, they really are miserable
We had something very similar up until about a month ago. They really are fThe tiles are worthy of their own mention as they really are particularly awful. When we first viewed the house, I had assumed that they were just grimy (it was a probate sale) but it turns out that that's actually the design. Like Artex and textured wallpaper (2 things I have spent a lot of time/money removing this year) I simply cannot imagine how anybody at any point in time could have thought that these tiles looked good.
Obviously we bought the house with plans to renovate it all so it wasn't a huge concern but even so, they really are miserable
king awful 
LennyM1984 said:
The beam is around 10" wide so I can easily build a stud wall frame below it - the issue is that because the edge of the beam is flush with the wall, I am going to have a 9mm edge sitting proud of the original wall. That is the bit I am struggling to solve. I might just overboard the lot and redo the door frame.
I meant you could have it "hanging" under the beam so that the plasterboard was flush. The beam itself would still be exposed but if it's sabded smooth and painted white it wouldn't stick out too much. Or you could wall paper it? cb31 said:
I can't offer any suggestions but was wondering how you get Google Gemini to do that for you? What are the kind of prompts you use?
These days you can be quite conversational and say things like, "visualise some ideas to help brighten up this kitchen. Add a slatted wood divider next to the doorway on the right and change the ceiling lights for downlights... Etc"As an aside, you can also really easily get it to break it's own copyright rules and ethical guidelines. I have to extoll the virtues of Ai as part of my job but the reality is is that it's not hugely " intelligent" and companies need to be a bit careful about how they use/feed it (which most big bluechips now are)
jimmyjimjim said:
No suggestion, just a question - what's the large vertical arrangement of white bars to the left of the window? A radiator? There's one under the window itself, so possibly not...hence the question.
Ha it is indeed a radiator, right next to a... you guessed it... radiator. I have no idea why! The smaller radiator will be goingjimmyjimjim said:
Ok. It didn't make sense being next to another one....hence the question!
Yeah it's a bit odd. It's quite a large room (you can't really tell from the photo but it goes back a fair way) so my assumption is that the smaller radiator wasn't enough to heat it and so somebody added anotherForums | Homes, Gardens and DIY | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff