My wife and I are putting chair rail in various places of our new home. We have seen a few pictures of rooms in magazines in which the chair rail was quite a bit higher (for instance, about 5 feet up on an 8 foot ceiling) than usual and liked the way it looked. My dad told us that we probably shouldn't do this. Anyone have any opinions?
Some older homes do have very high chair rails or what are sometimes called dados or wainscoting capped with chair rails. Sometimes they have ledges for hanging pictures or for resting plates and platters, too. Especially in Europe where you see it a lot more than in the states, chair rails or wainscoting will be higher on the wall because the ceilings are so much higher and they are intended to be in proportion with the height of the ceiling and also to make the room more cozy.
Well, it depends on what you want the chair rail for. If it really is to protect the walls against chairs, well, in those rooms you need it at chair height. But in the rooms where it's decorative, don't call it chair rail... call it decorative moulding and do exactly what you like. Putting it about a third of the way DOWN would be pretty... the 1/3:2/3 proportion is nice. Exactly half way is kind of static, so I would not do that.
Most likely what you were seeing was a picture rail ... those tend to be about 2 feet from the ceiling where as a traditional chair rail tends to be be about 2-3 feet from the floor. I think if the higher rail is something you like then its your perogative and go ahead!
I don't think it would look right unless the room is huge. It would throw the proportions off. Purpose is to protect the wall from chairs - hence the name. It is often just for looks but that tells you where it should be on your wall.
your chair rail should be the same height as your chair backs if in a dining room and if in another room they should be the height of the window ledge for the best effects.
