Panelling

With paneling (also plate working, panel-like, paneling, wainscoting, Switzerland. Paneling or paneling ) refers to the wooden wall or ceiling coverings of interiors and occurring in eastern Switzerland cladding of exterior facades, both as a room decoration as well as for thermal insulation or protection the underlying layers can be used. Until the 18th century such wood paneling were widely used in interior design and experienced in the wake of historicism with the Neo-Renaissance style again a short flowering.

A wainscot is in the simple case of wooden boards - the so-called panels - together, which are mounted on a substructure made of strips or battens and their abutting edges are often concealed for aesthetic reasons with an attached trim. Higher quality are the panels, which are designed as so-called frame - filling structures. The panel-like a wall is often divided vertically by pillars, columns or pilasters.

Already in ancient paneling were specifically used in Mesopotamia, these are but today only fragmentary. The oldest yet fully existing paneling are available on medieval castles, where they were used for insulation against cold. Boards with a width of up to one meter were to positioned on base Friesen and placed over the panels another frieze. In the guise of the ceiling panels were fastened with decorative nails to ceiling joists. In the late Middle Ages, it was customary to combine with furniture paneling by cupboards or benches were admitted into it.

At the purely functional tasks of paneling came the aspect of room decoration as early as the Renaissance. The wood was then provided with ornamental carvings and inlays or marquetry work, often painted or even gold plated. Especially Scandinavia, England and Northern Germany were present artistic leader. A particularly sophisticated and elaborate paneling is named after their role models in the French palace of the 17th and 18th century, wood paneling or Boisage. During the Baroque and the Rococo, it was often customary to leave paneling and furniture design for a room by the same cabinetmaker in order to match each other in the design.

In Rococo lost wooden paneling its original function as a thermal insulation and were carried out for reasons of fashion only to a maximum of half the room height. The upper now free wall surface was instead provided with wall - or panel paintings, but also covered with wallpaper or imposed by tapestries. Such reduced height paneling are called Dado and had besides the decoration purpose, the task of protecting a wall from mechanical damage, for example by furniture or passenger.

In the Alpine region the function of heat insulation remained until modern times, and is continued in the form of so-called " pine parlor ". In this room there is the "living room " in an alpine house, which is paneled with wood the stone pine.

A Ostschweizer specialty is the lining of the front facades of houses with gestemmtem paneling as they emerged in the second half of the 18th century and was used alongside the protection and insulation function initially mainly as an architectural style means. The built after the fire of 1780 buildings in the village square of Gais in the canton of Appenzell Ausserrhoden were equipped with a Fronttäfer.