Ceiling

“ The ceiling had been repeatedly whitewashed, but ever through the coverings that overlaid it, the butter mark reasserted itself.
I cannot say whether it was this which causes me always, on entering a room, to direct my eyes to the ceiling—but I do, and observe it always with much interest.
The ceiling of the world is not one blank space; it is sprinkled with stars at night, and strewn with clouds by day. Why then should the ceilings of our rooms be blank surfaces? We spread carpets of colour on our floors. We decorate richly our walls. ”

“ There are nine windows, three on each façade, and the ceiling is admirably diversified with inlaid-work of white, blue and gold, in the shape of circles, crowns and stars—a kind of imitation of the vault of heaven. ”

“ Beams, everywhere beams, blackened by age, sloping from roof to floor, from wall to cranny, so that to walk around the room partook of the nature of an obstacle race. Windows set carelessly in various angles overhead, patching the dark raftered ceiling with blue sky and drifting cloud. ”

“ The ceiling is so low at one place you can touch it with your hands. With rock above and on both sides of you and water beneath, you think you have a faint conception of Hades. You hear no sound but the gentle splash of the water struck by the oars, or the labored and rapid breathing of the more timid ones of your party. ”

“ The black oak rafters of the roof, polished as it were by age, meet overhead unconcealed by ceiling. Upon the wall in one place a figure seems at the first glance to be in the act to glide forth like a spectre from the solid stone. ”

“ The ceiling is flat, and formed into compartments by heavy square intersecting moulded ribs, the intermediate spaces of which are excessively adorned with cumbrous ornamental work of the most grotesque figures and designs imaginable, amidst which festoons of flowers, fruits, and other products of the earth, mingled with heraldic achievements, moulded in stucco, yet exist, to tell how many times the fruitage and the leaves outside have come and gone, have ripened and decayed, whilst they endure unchanged. ”

“ I know that a ceiling can soar, not menace, for have I not expanded under the gay lightness of the Pintoricchio ceiling in the Borgia apartments! Even the heavy and gilded ceiling of the Scuola di San Rocco at Venice, sombre enough in all conscience, by preserving architectural plausibility, and resting on painted pillars, escapes seeming to fall upon one’s head. Yet at best a ceiling is a poor place for any save the most simple design. ”

“ How exquisitely graceful is the tracery which covers the panels of the walls, and, mingling with the light clustered shafts of the corners and centre, leads the eye up to that richly ornamented ceiling. ”

“ The houses are of an incredible dirtiness. The ceiling, made up of a number of strips of wood, serves as a receptacle for all their food and for all their rags. Alongside with their faults I cannot but recognise some great qualities. They are honest and proud. There is nothing servile in the manner in which they receive you, with an air of frankness and genuine hospitality. ”

“ Filling all of the outer wall between the peephole, leaded windows and running- up to the slope of the ceiling, was a great fireplace of native white freestone, carved into fluted columns, foliated capitals, and a flat pediment of purest classic lines. ”

“ She opes her eyes, the ceiling sees above
Shutting the small alcove,
And thinks, till she must shut her eyes again,
Another ceiling she this night will know,
Another house, another bed, she lain
In a way she half guesses; so
She shuts her eyes to see not the room she
Soon will no longer see.
IV
Let the wide light come through the whole house now
Like a herald with brow
Garlanded round with roses and those leaves
That love for its love weaves!
Between her and the ceiling this day's ending
A man's weight will be bending. ”

“ But the longer you look, the less you will understand why I tell you to look. It is nothing but a whitewashed ceiling: vaulted indeed,—but so is many a tailor's garret window, for that matter. Indeed, now that you have looked steadily for a minute or so, and are used to the form of the arch, it seems to become so small that you can almost fancy it the ceiling of a good-sized lumber-room in an attic.
Having attained to this modest conception of it, carry your eyes back to the similar vault of the second compartment, nearer you. ”

“ The ceiling, with its two beams [Pg 250] and joists, painted in light tones, set off by black and white lines, seemed to enlarge the apartment, and gave it a warm and habitable appearance, presenting on hot days lights and shades of an amber tint. The wall between the ceiling and the wainscot was hung with painted canvas. The chimney-piece stood out in bold relief on this back-ground. The entrance end of the drawing-room would have been rather sombre if the wide opening into the billiard-room had not flooded it with light, softened by the verdure of the plants within the little conservatory. ”

“ The colour of your walls once established, keep in mind two things: that to be agreeable to the artistic eye your ceilings must be lighter than your sidewalls, and your floors darker. Broadly speaking, it is Nature's own arrangement, green trees and hillsides, the sky above, and the dark earth beneath our feet. A ceiling, if lighter in tone than the walls, gives a sense of airiness to a room. Floors, whether of exposed wood, completely carpeted, or covered by rugs, must be enough darker than your sidewalls to "hold down your room," as the decorators say. ”

“ Walls and ceiling are black with the accretions of filth which have gathered upon them through long years of neglect. It is exuding through cracks in the boards overhead; it is running down the walls; it is everywhere. ”

“ The ceiling is remarkable for presenting to the eye the appearance of a uniform extensive surface, as if it were a beautifully broad elliptical vault, though in fact it consists of a double range of groined arches that, springing on each side from the walls, and blending together in the middle, are supported on a row of six pillars planted in a line on the ground. ”

“ But it was the vaulted ceiling of the gallery that he treated with the greatest care. He made a great series of pictures from scenes in the Old Testament, and some from the New, and his pupils painted these upon the ceiling, so that it came to be known popularly as "Raphael's Bible."
The ceiling is not flat, and it does not stretch [12] without break, but the gallery is like a succession of arched porches, and the ceiling of each is divided into panels, sloping in four directions, with a flat panel in the centre. ”

“ You shall have my room, a little place over the kitchen, with a ceiling that follows the slant of the roof down one side, against which you will bump your head times innumerable until you learn to remember that it is there, and a looking glass which will make one of your eyes as small as a pea and the other as big as an orange. ”

“ A low ceiling insures ease in warming, and in our climate where one has to depend on fires for nine months in the year, this is something worth while. In general, I have noticed in rooms that the sense of snugness and comfort dies out as the ceiling rises in height—rooms twelve and fifteen feet high may be all very grand and very fine, but they are never sociable, they never seem to brood over you, soothe you, and take you to their heart as the motherly low-browed room does. ”

“ The ceiling, covered with silvered arabesque-work, was so high that a long metal shaft was necessary to allow the many-armed silver chandelier with its forest of tall white candles to swing in the middle of the great space. Below the ceiling came silver-framed coats-of-arms in faded colours. The walls were edged with silver, and hung with white silk with yellow spots, not to mention a split here and there. ”

“ The ceiling is painted cream and decorated in gold relief, the walls are hung with gold brocaded silk, carpets and curtains, settees and chairs all in character. On the walls may be seen some costly Italian pictures, collected by Lord Dufferin, also a few more miniatures of Rajahs. The marble mantels in this suite of rooms are also a special feature, so beautifully are they carved; also you will note the graceful crystal chandeliers and parquetry floors. ”

“ The form of the ceiling offers too many facilities for bumping your head and too few for shaving. And the note of the tomcat as he sings to his love in the stilly night outside on the tiles becomes positively distasteful when heard so near. ”

“ Overhead, supported by a self-sustaining power, without the aid of a single pillar, is the original ceiling of oak, precisely similar in shape to the roof of a barn, with all the beams and rafters plainly to be seen. At the remote height of sixty feet, you hardly discern that they are carved with figures of angels and doubtless many other devices, of which the admirable Gothic art is wasted in the duskiness that has so long been brooding there. ”

“ I went to my bewitched mason and said to him, 'Thomas, I wish you would help me. I am very anxious to have a first-class decorated ceiling to that ball-room, and you know what these Londoners be: they do all by machinery, and you buy a ceiling by the yard—nasty, vulgar stuff I would be ashamed to have seen here. I'll tell you what it is, Thomas, those Londoners come out of town and sail about the country in the holiday time picking up ideas. I think we must show them how a thing in ceilings ought to be done, and let them understand that we are not such fools as they take us to be. ”

“ It is rare to see a ceiling differing from the conventional form, consisting of light, thin, square strips as ceiling-beams, upon which rest crosswise thin planks of wood with their edges overlapping. One sees this form of ceiling everywhere, from north to south, in inns, private dwellings, and shops. ”

“ The two, great, hand-hewn beams in the ceiling have been left exposed, and the fact that they have settled a little on their supports, sagging toward one end, only adds to the effect, just as the unevenness of a hand-drawn line is more beautiful than the accuracy of one ruled. ”

“ So let us exercise common sense and face our especial ceiling problem in an architectural spirit. If your house has structural beams, leave them exposed, if you like, but treat them as beams; stain them, and wax them, and color the spaces between them cream or tan or warm gray, and then make the room beneath the beams strong enough in color and furnishings to carry the impressive ceiling. ”

“ It is placed at the end opposite the entrance, and commands a fine prospect, the inlet of the Dee forming a conspicuous object in the landscape. The pattern of the ceiling, which is decorated with compartments numerously subdivided and intersected, is formed in four divisions issuing from clustered pillars with foliated capitals, and united in the centre to an hexagonal frame, elaborately reticulated, from which issues a pendant of foliage sustaining a superb chandelier of crystal. The number and variety of the carved knots and foliage add to the beauty of the ceiling ”

“ The white ceiling is of simple design with boldly carved mouldings and is supported by columns embossed in gold of exquisite workmanship. Some of the panels are of curiously woven tapestries, the fruit of oriental looms. Chandeliers of beautiful design in rich bronze and crystal depend from the ceiling. ”

“ The simplest and most natural way of decorating a ceiling is to show the underside of the joists and beams duly moulded, and if you will, painted in patterns. How far this is from being possible in our modern makeshift houses, I suppose I need not say. Then there is a natural and beautiful way of ornamenting a ceiling by working the plaster into delicate patterns, such as you see in our Elizabethan and Jacobean houses; which often enough, richly designed and skilfully wrought as they are, are by no means pedantically smooth in finish—nay, may sometimes be called rough as to workmanship. ”

“ For the ordinary, or comparatively inexpensive home, we need not consider the ceiling an object for serious study, because it is so constantly out of the line of sight, and because its natural colourless condition is no bar to the general colour-effect. ”

“ But the most imposing feature of the hall is its beautiful oak staircase, which, rising from beneath the window, conducts to a gallery which crosses the hall, and communicates with the bed-rooms over the principal apartments. The ceiling is of dark oak, supported by principals which spring from golden corbels, and it is enlivened by golden bosses, which are placed at the various crossings of the rich woodwork, and have a most pleasing effect from the contrasting relief which they give to its pervading dark colour. ”

“ The triangular ceiling, in effect is an attempt to extend the lintel in sections across the vault of a chamber in the place of joists, and, so far as the writer is aware, the only attempt ever made by any barbarous people to form a ceiling of stone over ordinary residence rooms. In a wall and ceiling formed in this manner, and carried up several feet above the apex of the triangular arch, there would be no lateral thrust outward of the masonry. ”

“ The compartment was awe-inspiring in size. A blue vaulted ceiling rose a thousand feet overhead. From wall to wall was the same distance. The floor beneath them was metallic, not translucent. It appeared as solid as any Earth metal. ”

“ The ceiling of your room is six feet below the level of the street, the walls are three feet thick and felted, and the bricks set all as headers, which makes a great difference in conducting power. The windows, as perhaps you have already observed, are secluded from vulgar eyes, and command a very partial view of our own little Eden. ”