The moulding was a strip of shaped wood nailed where the wall met the ceiling. Crown moulding. A curve that turned the right angle into a transition. The wall did not stop and the ceiling did not start. The moulding said there is a place between the two and the place between the two is where the eye rests. The modern room has no moulding. The wall meets the ceiling at a right angle and the right angle says nothing. The right angle is the sound of two surfaces crashing into each other.

The moulding was run by hand. The carpenter pushed a block of wood across a blade shaped to the profile he wanted. Ogee. Cove. Bead. Ovolo. Every profile had a name and every name was a shape and every shape was a shadow. The moulding worked by casting shadows. The curve of the ogee caught the light on one side and cast a shadow on the other and the shadow was the moulding's second self. Without the shadow the moulding was just a bump on the wall. The shadow made it architecture.

The moulding was layered. Crown moulding was not one piece. Crown moulding was three or four pieces built up in layers. The bottom piece was the bed moulding. The middle piece was the fascia. The top piece was the crown. Each piece was a different profile and the profiles stacked together into a composition. The composition was the carpenter's sentence. Each piece was a word and the sentence said this room was built by a person who cared about the conversation between the wall and the ceiling.

The moulding hid the crack. Where the wall met the ceiling the plaster cracked because the wall and the ceiling moved at different rates. The moulding covered the crack. That was the practical reason. But the beauty was not practical. The beauty was the excess. The carpenter could have nailed a flat strip over the crack and called it done. Instead the carpenter ran a profile with three curves and two beads and the profile took an hour to cut and the hour was the gift. The flat strip solves the problem. The moulding solves the problem and then says something about it.

Nobody runs moulding anymore. The modern room has a bead of caulk where the wall meets the ceiling. A white line. A line that says somebody noticed the crack and decided to fill it with silicone. The caulk line is honest. The caulk line says there is a gap and I filled it. The moulding was more than honest. The moulding was generous. The moulding said there is a gap and I turned it into a gift. Generosity is honesty with something extra. The something extra is the whole point.

See also: Wainscoting, Lath