Attractive, Easy to Install Polyurethane Moldings

Few things improve the look of a home’s interior as quickly as molding and other wall and ceiling accents. Crown molding, wainscoting, and panel inserts instantly add a touch of old world refinement to even the most mundane of rooms. Fortunately for the do-it-yourself (DIY) crowd, the ease of installation and recent availability on a retail basis of polyurethane moldings is simplifying the process. Unlike wood products, these urethane decorative moldings provide sharper design features, resist splitting, do not rot or mildew, are lighter and even cost less.

With wood moldings, the task of assembling all the component pieces correctly, particularly in the corners, often discourages many from tackling the job. For most non-professionals, making precisely placed 45-degree cuts on crown molding is difficult. Hiring a contractor to install the molding presents an equally difficult option because of the greatly increased cost.

To counter these drawbacks, many are turning to high-density polyurethane moldings.

“My husband and I just bought our house and we wanted to finish it off so we purchased some polyurethane molding from our local big-box home improvement store,” recounts Ann Gibson, a DIY homeowner. “We chose the Architectural Ornament product because of its quality appearance and because it didn’t look hard to install.”

Architectural Ornament Inc. is the largest volume polyurethane decorative molding manufacturer in North America, offering a complete line of quality interior and exterior accent polyurethane moldings available at Lowe’s and similar home improvement stores.

Architectural Ornament is the first molding manufacturer to provide matching corner blocks, which are very short pieces of molding created for the sole purpose of laying molding in and around corners without the need to do compound mitering. Since the 90-degree angle is built right into the piece, straight cuts on any miter saw are all that’s necessary to create perfectly matched corners.

“We didn’t have to do any precision cutting ourselves; it was very easy for us to install,” continues Gibson. “We're not professionals, but we used the corner blocks and they fit in perfectly.”

Because polyurethane products are molded, manufacturers are able to accurately control the tolerances and profile mating from one piece to another. This yields intricately detailed, yet sharp, features, permitting a wide variety of attractive patterns – many of them so uniquely artistic as to be copyrighted.

“We picked the Architectural Ornament polyurethane molding because we thought they displayed better quality,” says Gibson. “Some of the other architectural moldings we looked at weren’t as nicely finished. They had ragged edges and bumps.”

Urethane decorative moldings typically come pre-primed and ready to paint. This primer accepts a broad range of specialty finishes such as: decoupage, crackling, verdigris, metallic, wood grain, stenciling and even marbleizing.

Besides crown moldings, matching polyurethane molding products include baseboards, rosettes, ceiling medallions, chair rails, panel moldings, wall niches, and corner decorations.

Polyurethane moldings often cost less than their decorative wood counterparts. For example, a piece of polyurethane crown molding at home improvement stores typically range from $1.85 to $2.95 per foot, depending on the design.

When you consider the cost of labor involved with measuring, cutting, and then the mitering, polyurethane moldings represent a genuine bargain.

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For more information:
Architectural Ornament
55 Bradwick Drive
Concord, Ontario
L4K 1K5 Canada
www.architectural-ornament.com
Phone: 905-738-9459; 1-800-567-3554
Fax 905-738-6734
E-mail: info@architectural-ornament.com