Cornice Supplies and How To

Hi everybody, just wanted to give everybody a quick list of what we did to put our cornices together :)

Supplies we picked up at our local Home Depot

1) one sheet 4x8 foot half inch plywood (makes four 38 inch wide cornices)
2) wood glue
3) wood screws ( number 6 one inch long)
4) 2 brackets, four 2 inch number 8 screws and 4 half inch number 8 screws per cornice.

At our local Home Depot all this cost a little under $80 so about 20 bucks per cornice so far.....

Our local home depot will also cut the wood for us. Below is a sketch of your rough cuts.

It works out pretty nicely, The only waste you'll have is the pieces at the bottom right.... If you're able to have your local Home Depot or Lowes cut this for you start with the cuts at the bottom and at the far right. 

Also on the far right of the board you cant see it the picture but you want to cut one inch strips, these will be your support pieces.

Next you'll want to put the pieces together, each cornice will need:

1) 1 38"x20" panel, 2 20"x4" turns, 1 4"x37" top, 2 1"x19" supports

2) screw and glue all the pieces together

* Put a bead of glue along all edges and use at least two screws per side,  you can do this either before,  after or during the gluing... the point is that you want to use both glue and screws.

When your done you should have a nice very solid box similar to what was shown on the RoadtotheRavenna blog.

Putting fabric onto the box is a two person job....

1) Select the material style you like, Donna and I spent a lot of time looking through fabrics.... you'll need to select a material that is thick enough to be stretched taut and can hold staples.  

2) For these box sizes a standard yard of fabric off of a bolt (36"x54") will do per cornice.

3) A staple gun, we used 5/8 inch staples.

4) Batting, about 1 yard per cornice

We used a decent material, it was about $40 a yard, so our cornices cost us about $60 a piece.  A pretty good deal, up here a cornice with a custom material like this goes for about $180 to $200.  Depending on the material you choose your total cost per cornice could be a little higher or lower.

Putting the material on is best done by two people.  First staple the batting on.... then, Donna and I wrestled with the box and material for about a half hour before we had all the fabric stapled on.  Be sure to do your best to hold the material taut and use plenty of staples.

Once all the material is attached trim around the back as needed.

Hanging the cornice can be a little cumbersome too.  Having two people helps, one to hold the cornice in place one to put the screws in.  The approach we used was to put up the brackets on the wall first and then to attach the cornice to the other side of the bracket.  It helped to pre drill the holes for the screw.   

Good luck everybody :)