Add interest to a home with a curved wall

Press, 13 March 1986, Page 23

Add interest to a home with a curved wall

Take a look around your home. The chances are that every wall you see is dead straight, dead flat and dead square. After a while, all this sameness can become deadly dull. One of the best ways to add some visual interest to this monotony is to create a section of curved wall. The flowing lines of the curve go a long way to softening the look a room, eliminating the rigid feeling and making it feel more comfortable.

If you’d like to throw your house a curve, the basic procedure is to create a curved framework consisting of plywood top and bottom plates, joined together with straight 100 x 50 studs as shown in . the sketch. You then cover the framing with ordinary 12mm drywall. Start by roughing out the location of the curved section. Aim for a curve with a radius of at least one metre. If you go for a curve much sharper than that, you may have trouble making your wallboard bend without breaking. After locating the curved section, draw it out roughly on the floor or ceiling. If you are replacing an angled section of wall, remove as much of the old wall as required to make room for the curve.

Next, make plywood top and bottom plates, sawed out of 20mm plywood to the desired shape of the curved section. To do this, take a strip of wood a bit longer than your desired wall radius. Drill a pivot

hole near one end. At the other end drill a pencil hole. The distance between these holes should equal the radius of your curve.

Drive a nail through the pivot hole in your stick, into the plywood you will use for your plates. Put a pencil through the other hole and draw the arc of your curve right on the plywood.

That’s the outside curve of your late. Now drill a second pencil hole, exactly 90mm closer than the first to the pivot point and draw a second arc. This will give you the inside arc of your plate. You should now have an outline of your plate, to the proper curve, and exactly 90mm wide. Cut this piece out with a sabre saw and use it as a pattern for three more pieces. These four pieces will be used in pairs to make the double-layer plates shown in the sketch.

Now position your plates. Nail the top one in place to the ceiling joists. Then use a plumb bob to locate the floor plate directly below the ceiling plate and nail it down to the floor.

Next, toenail studs between the two plates. In the curved section, space the studs about 200 mm apart, centre to centre. That’s half the normal spacing distance for studs, but you need it to get a good true curve. Once the studs are in place, you are almost ready to put up your drywall. Don’t try putting any vertical seams along the curved section. If you

do, the drywall will not flow smoothly in a curve at the joint, and will most likely break. You will have to Install the drywall horizontally, and you may need 3.6 metre sheets to run all the way around the curve without a joint. Pre-bend the drywall before putting it up. To do this, wet both surfaces with a sponge and slowly bend the drywall to shape. By slowly, I mean over a period of an hour or more. One way to do this

is to lean the drywall — on end — against a wall, and let it begin to sag under its own weight. Keep an eye on the sheets and don’t let them sag too far or they may break. Once the sheets are pre-bent, you can nail them in place. Start with the inside surface of the wall. This is the more difficult to apply, and if you do it first, you’ll be able to look through the

open side of the wall, to make sure the sheet is pulling up snug against the studs. Start at one end of the sheet and nail it firmly in place. You’ll need at least one, and probably two, helpers to support the sheet and press it into place while you nail. Do the top half of the wall first, then the bottom. After the inner surface is covered, do the outer surface. Let the damp drywall dry out, then tape

the seams and finish off as usual.

Finally, remember to bend the drywall slowly. If you give it enough time, it will take a fairly tight radius. Do not put any vertical seams within the curved section. Your sheets should start and end in the straight section of wall flanking your curve. If you end a sheet on the curve, the nails will probably pull through and the drywall will fall apart.