What's it called? I'd call it gone and move on.

It’s a soffit. Soffits are usually used to hide wires or hvac components. You can’t know what is in there until you look inside. I wouldn’t think it is structural but you just have to look. Someone decided to “hide” it by putting a piece of wood there. It draws attention to it instead.

This could be a soffit for indirect lighting only. Indirect lighting from coves or soffits has been around since the 1920s or 1930s and cycles in and out of popularity, but with the emergence of LED lighting strips and tape, it has been coming back in popularity, especially in commercial settings.

This is Frank Lloyd Wright's Taliesin, started in 1911, but I think this is the c. 1928 version

In any case I think the junction of the wall to the steeply angled wall behind the soffit will be pretty awkward without the soffit. It might be too steep to be a nice transition.

I'd think long and hard about the acoustics in the room before I removed that. Nothing worse than being in a large expensive room in which the designer has thought of everything except how it sounds when you are there.

Re-read OP's post... they removed it and have spent the past two years trying to determine whether it had any purpose, structural or otherwise. :)

I thought they just removed the lighting.

Maybe OP will clarify....

No I think you're right. I was thrown off because it's a little late to ask if it's structural.

Yes we removed it. The reason I ask if it was structural is because over the past two years, some pretty bad cracks and other things have started to develop in the surrounding walls.

A little bit of background- We are first time homeowners and regrettably made many mistakes when purchasing our first home.

I also was asking if anyone knew the name because I feel like it looks a little awkward now that is has been removed and if I knew the name of it I could research ideas or see pictures of what other people did during a remodel if they removed it.

Thank you so much to everyone for the help! I forgot to attach pictures of the “after”, sorry for any confusion on whether it was removed already. I will post them now.

It looks so much nicer without it Amanda! I cannot tell from the pictures if it was structural, but I somehow doubt it. I suspect it was almost like tray ceiling lighting. Your cracking could just be that homes expand and contract and cracking is natural. And, not odd for that to happen where drywall seams might be.

Awe thank you Kendrah! Good to know and makes me feel better, thanks again!

Here’s a couple more pics

Since it is now gone, and since you are getting cracks, etc, and since we cant really tell if anything is structural on the internet pictures, I would hire a very good contractor, to look it all over. Yes, cracks can come naturally, with house settling, but, there is no way to tell for sure, if you havent had it looked at in person, by a qualified person. Get it looked at and either a plan to put it back, or know that its ok, so you can rest a bit easier.

Shasta thank you for the name of what it is! Solves a long mystery in this house. We also had them in the bathrooms and removed as well. No issues there. We didn’t do it ourselves, we had it professionally done but I just hope the people we hired knew what they were doing 😬

Thank you 3onthetree. These photos are mostly 1+ years old. There are new cracks now. I’ll upload some pictures in a little bit. I’m glad to know it’s not structural though, that’s a relief! The reason I thought it might be structural is because there’s also cracks in the surrounding walls of the living room now. And when we purchased the home we were told the foundation had been repaired a few years prior and we didn’t notice any cracks when we bought it (and they definitely had not updated anything in a while, they were in their 90s).

I’m going to be a Debby Downer but since you already said you’ve made mistakes being a first time home buyer…you’re still making them. Do not take free internet advice as the final word when it comes to things like structural issues, electric, plumbing etc based on a couple of photos you posted. While it might absolutely be true that shelf wasn’t structural, and it probably wasn’t, don’t leave it up to random people online to diagnose what might be serious. And secondly, just because the guys you hired to remove it didn’t say anything doesn’t equate to then it must be okay. You have to specifically ask, can and should this be done. Workers do what you pay them to do and it’s the rare person that talks you out of giving them money because it might cause problems later on.

Of course you are correct Ms Downer but on the other hand mistakes such as Amanda's actually saves lurkers money by preventing them making same mistake. I have a feeling it still isn't over so I'm waiting around to see what else can be learned.

@aifl Thank you. I welcome any and all advice. I definitely wouldn’t take free internet advice as the final word. Especially given that I didn’t really include any pictures of the cracks.
Also, we definitely did indeed ask the contractor and his crew if it could/should be taken down and they said it was not structural and purely decorative. There were other walls and openings that we wanted to remove but they advised against it because those needed to stay for structural purposes.