The Space Above: Beautiful Barrel-Vaulted Ceilings
Create Spaciousness and Intimacy With a Ceiling Shaped Like the Sky
Houzz Contributor. My name is Bud Dietrich and I am an architect located in the Tampa Bay area of Florida. I am licensed to practice architecture in Illinois, Florida, New Jersey & Wisconsin and I am a certificate holder from the National Council of Architectural Registration Boards (NCARB). Since 1996 I have worked from my home office and provide full architectural services exclusively to the single family residential market. My passion is to transform my clients' houses into their homes. I strive to have the "new" home accommodate my clients' lives without fighting them at every junction. I look to add curb appeal to encourage a beautiful streetscape. And I design any addition to look and feel like it has always been there.
Our projects have won numerous design awards as well as having...
Houzz Contributor. My name is Bud Dietrich and I am an architect located... More »
There's that scene in the first Harry Potter movie when Harry, Hermione and Ron walk into the great dining hall at Hogwarts for the first time. The room is vast and has a ceiling that seems to disappear into the night sky, adding mystery, wonder and magic to the scene.
One of the ways we can capture that same feeling in our own homes is to use a barrel vaulted ceiling. These ceilings open up and provide height to a room, allowing views to the sky and landscape beyond. And these ceilings can be finished in a range of different materials, from white painted drywall to beadboard to stenciling and more.
Architects and designers often will use a barrel-vaulted ceiling in a dining space. While the ceiling makes the room grand, friends and family gather around the table to enjoy a good meal and conversation. The experience is a wonderful combination of spaciousness and intimacy all at the same time.
One of the ways we can capture that same feeling in our own homes is to use a barrel vaulted ceiling. These ceilings open up and provide height to a room, allowing views to the sky and landscape beyond. And these ceilings can be finished in a range of different materials, from white painted drywall to beadboard to stenciling and more.
Architects and designers often will use a barrel-vaulted ceiling in a dining space. While the ceiling makes the room grand, friends and family gather around the table to enjoy a good meal and conversation. The experience is a wonderful combination of spaciousness and intimacy all at the same time.
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| A barrel-vaulted ceiling captures and frames a beautiful view. If you place a piece of paper over the top of the picture, you'll see just how much the barrel vault adds to the sense of space and how it can make the landscape a part of the home. Without the barrel vault, it just wouldn't be the same. |
A barrel vault is the perfect shape ceiling for a dining room such as this. The ceiling's extra height and dimension adds spaciousness to a room while its shape — an arc that defines an enclosing circle — creates intimacy. It's as if we are outdoors with the vault of heaven above as we gather around to enjoy good food and good conversation.
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| With windows on three sides and an elliptical window at the vault, this breakfast room enjoys plenty of sun. It's a great place to view the yard, treetops and sky when having that morning cup of coffee or enjoying the Sunday crossword puzzle.
Open to the kitchen at one end, it also provides a light and bright space for children doing homework while the cook is making dinner. |
The windows and doors, in combination with linear pattern of the wood ceiling finish, take the viewer out to the landscape beyond.
In this large dining room for 12, the half-circle shape of the vault adds the needed height and spaciousness. Sliver-like slots have been introduced into the ceiling's sides to increase the amount of light coming into the space and avoid a monolithic vault.
Barrel-vaulted ceilings can be richly decorated. This often works best when there's no opportunity for a large window to capture light and view. Whether decorated as a tapestry or other pattern, a ceiling like this adds a richness of detail that's hard to beat.
by Red Barn Studio
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A soaking tub is the centerpiece of this charming bathroom. The ceiling vault and large window give emphasis to the tub while allowing the vanity to be a more intimate area with a lower ceiling. The beadboard finish of the ceiling is a nice touch as it softens the formality of the room just enough.
| This contemporary-style bedroom employs a warm, wood-finished vault to achieve a spare and clean spaciousness that goes well beyond just white walls. The wood finish visually lowers the ceiling, giving the room more intimacy. |
Here is another barrel-vaulted bedroom. This has a more intimate scale and a more traditional aesthetic — proof that a barrel vault can bring any style of space to life. The gentle curve and single color blur the distinction between wall and ceiling, making the space intimate and peaceful while the barrel vault allows for height and light.
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| Here's a nice office and certainly a place I wouldn't mind working in, although I probably would spend the day sitting by those doors daydreaming! The ceiling incorporates two classic design elements: a shallow barrel vault and coffering. While the coffers add structure and formality to the room, the shallow vault ensures we don't take it all too seriously. |
by Tongue & Groove
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A barrel vault is a nice way to make a transition between rooms. This barrel vaulted ceiling is set lower to give the passage between rooms a more human scale. It's also nice that the entry door and the vault share the same geometry, tying the two spaces together.
This passage between two rooms uses the vault to conceal indirect lighting and provide a display space. The richness of detail is nice to see in a small (and often simply utilitarian) area.
This is an especially nice perch from which to gaze onto the landscape. The extension of the barrel vaulted ceiling from inside to outside adds to the sense of being above and detached from the surrounding landscape, but still a part of it.
by Stonewood, LLC
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Little dormers at the sides of this barrel vault let in extra sun and light. And the simple molding laid out in a grid gives the ceiling structure and interest.
I love the way this barrel vaulted ceiling seems to just float, an effect achieved by having that "shadow line" between the start of the ceiling and the soffit above the kitchen sink.
The curved, wood laminated beam that forms the arc of the vault is structural and left unfinished. The warmth and richness of the wood and gentle curve of the vault provide a nice contrast to the kitchen's white, metallic, shiny and hard surfaces.
The curved, wood laminated beam that forms the arc of the vault is structural and left unfinished. The warmth and richness of the wood and gentle curve of the vault provide a nice contrast to the kitchen's white, metallic, shiny and hard surfaces.
An older building with a large and elegant barrel-vaulted ceiling becomes the ideal setting for this modern kitchen and dining area. While the age, size, design and scale of the vaulted ceiling gives the space permanence and history, the "floating" kitchen and dining areas — as well as the modern plywood furniture — give a feeling of the temporal and transient. It's a perfect balance of old and new, modern and contemporary.
More:
Great Box-Beam Ceilings
Get the Look of Rustic Wood Beams
See more photos of ceilings in home design
More:
Great Box-Beam Ceilings
Get the Look of Rustic Wood Beams
See more photos of ceilings in home design
Ideabook updated on Aug. 16, 2011.
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