Decorative molding (or moulding) is high on most people’s home improvement to-do lists. They want to ADD more molding. I want to start by getting rid of some molding. I am no expert, but I do have strong opinions on what looks good and what doesn’t. My home is full of examples of what I think DOES NOT look good.
Last night I took the first step to changing that. I removed the base molding in our downstairs hallway. I was left with a gap of almost 3/4″ between the hardwood flooring and the drywall.
So now we’ll just have to wait and see how long it takes me to put in new molding. I wasn’t really planning to tear that out and I have a bunch of other projects on my list. But the real problem, of course, is figuring out what to do with the gap between the wood and the wall. I’ve been considering a few options.
Option #1 –
Cut up some spare pieces of flooring to fit in the gap. This will only work where the floor boards are parallel to the wall. I foresee myself having to tear out a bit of the floor. But don’t worry, I already know I can do it. No sooner had I installed hardwood floor in our old kitchen, as part of our complete remodel, we had a pluming leak that ruined a 4 ft section from one wall to the other. I had already installed all the base cabinets ON TOP of the hardwood floor, so I had to fit new pieces in to the strip with no wiggle room. This should be easier. No cabinets on top.
Option #2 –
This RapidFit moulding from Lowe’s might work. It’s designed to go over existing jacked up moulding. Cool right? So maybe I should wait to tear the rest of the moulding in my house out until I see how it will work. Of course it’s online only, otherwise I would have tried it today. It is 7/8 thick, which would cover the gap in almost all spots, however, the base moulding would protrude past the door casing and that will probably look stupid. It’s still worth a shot. I guess I could RapidFit the door casings too, but now we’re just getting crazy.
So take home message for today — If you’re going to take the time to put down hardwood flooring make sure you remove the base molding first. Capping it with giant quarter round only makes it look stupid.
Option #3 –
Install thicker 3/4″ base molding that will cover the expansion gap.
Update: I went with option #3 and installed 5.5″ x 3/4″ base molding, which was part of the board and batten paneling I installed. It covers up the gap just fine. Yay! Problem solved.
My biggest molding pet peeves:
Pet peeve #1 — Not removing baseboard when installing new floor
OMG don’t be so lazy people! I’m talking to those of you who have replaced your floor and tried to take the easy way out. It doesn’t look good.
If you’re confused, let me explain. Let’s say you move into a house but you decide you want new floors (wood, tile, laminate, vinyl, cork, etc.). You either decide to install it yourself or you hire someone to do it. It becomes clear that it’s cheaper and easier to leave the existing base molding in place. The problem is that most types of flooring need a little room around the edges to allow for expansion and contraction. If you don’t leave a vertical gap your wood can end up getting all warped as it expands and the pieces press up against each other.
If you leave the base molding in place and install new flooring, you must leave a gap in front of your existing base molding. That space now needs to be covered by quarter round molding. Yuck. You’ve not only shrunk your base molding by covering the bottom part with new flooring, but now you’ve covered even more with quarter round. You’re left with a teeny-tine base molding and an ugly quarter round and it’s just not pretty.
Pet peeve #2 — Quarter round molding
I understand there is a purpose for quarter round molding. It can cover expansion gaps that are necessary for some types of flooring (like hardwood) and can hide vertical gaps between base molding and uneven floor boards. I get it. What I hate is when you see it EVERYWHERE. Like instead of measuring and cutting something correctly, let’s just throw some quarter round molding over it. It goes hand in hand with pet peeve #1. You don’t need to use quarter round molding when installing a new floor. Instead you could remove the base molding, install the new floor, then reattach the base molding, or install new molding, ON TOP of the new floor. That way the expansion gap is hidden by the base molding and there’s no need for ugly quarter round. It would look like this:
Source: onflooring.com
Here is another area of my house with too much molding going on.
This area had been bothering me for a long time, so I took some aggression out on it last night. I’ll just add fixing it to my to-do list.
Other rooms in my house that have new base molding
I’ve redone the floor in the laundry room and basement of my house and in both instances the baseboard was removed and new installed. In the basement I used an indoor/outdoor PVC material from Lowe’s because the basement has been known to flood. It has worked out perfectly! (Tutorial on painting the stairs HERE)
In my laundry room, I installed cork flooring and standard 3 1/4″ primed base molding without any quarter round. (Read post HERE) I now wish I had used a higher base molding, which is what I ended up with in the rest of the house. 
Here are some other ideas from around the web:
Instead of quarter ROUND, use something with a more interesting shape, like shoe molding. A true base shoe is taller than it is wide, enabling it to conceal a large vertical gap without appearing chunky. Source: House of Turquoise
Use it in the right proportions. In my house the quarter round was nearly half as tall as the base molding, which looked really silly. I could have replace the baseboards with ones that were the same thickness, but much taller, say 6″ and then added quarter round. This would have been much more proportional. 
I guess quarter-round is a matter of taste. Personally I think it looks fine if done well. I think the cork floors are ugly but that’s just my personal taste.
Quarter round keeps furniture legs away from the base or Sheetrock enough to keep the upper part of the item from gouging the wall when moves back towards it or if it leans such as with a bookcase. It also is a very cheap alternative to beadboard wainscoting and chair rail for a room like a dining room for example. Generally its used as a minimal amount of trim to cover a flooring or wall gap, as well as to keep a vacuum cleaner from gouging up a wall when being used. It looks best on a wood or even a tile floor, but maybe not as much on thicker carpet.
While I prefer nice moulding and hate the plain trim that passes for moulding in tract houses, I agree with Sharon that quarter round looks good if done properly, although I’m not sure what you mean by ‘giant’ quarter round. Maybe your prior owners got a deal on the wood flooring but couldn’t afford to replace both the floor and moulding. I’d rather have better flooring with quarter round than lesser flooring with w/out quarter round, but that’s just my opinion.
Hi Liz,
Two comments: 1st, quarter round is often used to provide a better transition between hard floor (like wood and tile) and trims. Trims are usually very straight on the horizontal plane, while the floors, especially in older houses, can have high and low spots. The quarter round flexes more than the moulding and can hide any gaps.
2nd, while I can’t tell from your picture, sometimes there are extra transitions in order to provide an expansion gap in long runs of flooring. I saw one large custom home which had an unobstructed run of flooring from one exterior wall to the other, some 100′ or so. They had several issues of floor buckling already, and the home was (literally) brand new. Strategic transitions can ease or eliminate that.
THANK YOU! i came here to say just that.
i think the pointless transition in the doorway was the result of removing carpet in one room and putting down flooring to match the other room. instead of feathering it in (which is a pain in the back side) the contractor just put in a transition and called it a day.
I hate quarter round, too! My new house has none and it looks so much nicer. Just tall baseboards against hardwood floors. My biggest pet peeve is quarter round that’s stained to match the floors. I absolutely hate the way it looks against white baseboards. Unlike other Sharon, I love your cork floors!
Two peas in a pod we are. 😉
It may be a peeve, but if someone wants to much larger retrofit projects than a small hallway and get done in days and not weeks the use of base shoe or cove moulding is indispensable. Quite often the wall paint gets marred during removal and requires touch-ups (very time-consuming) unless you go with a taller baseboard. Putting existing baseboard back can be done, but requires significant touch-up work on baseboard, also very time-consuming. I do agree it [base shoe] does look better with a taller baseboard. In addition, flooring made of any natural material should have expansion joints every 30′ or so. Otherwise buckling or gaps will appear unless you live in an area of constant temperature and humidity.
Agreed. I’m almost finished replacing all of my baseboards and it is a huge pain in the butt. Mainly because it’s hard to get the old baseboards out now that they are wedged 3/4″ down behind the hardwood, but I usually pawn that job off on my husband. New 6.5″ trim is going in!
You should take part in a contest for the most effective blogs on the web. I will suggest this site!
I have a question. I have wooden floors that the previous owners destroyed. I am putting new floating flooring over it. I have ase moulding up already that cant be taken off and replaced because I have plaster walls and the walls would probably fall apart where the moulding is removed.. The moulding is also the real old fashioned moulding that is almost 6 inches high with a cap. Teh moulding is painted white.. do i paint the quarter roujnd or the other moulding the same as the wall or stain the color of the floor?
From my experience it is actually a regional thing. A few years ago I would have told you definitely white and that I think wood stained quarter round looks weird. But… stained quarter round seems to be the norm in some places. What do your neighbors have? In very general terms, I’d say white in northern regions and wood stained in southern regions. The good news is that you can’t go wrong either way! Both are perfectly acceptable. Painting them white is definitely easier though. Easier to hide nail holes for sure! Good luck!!
Yes and yes! My house has crazy person pieces of trim everywhere and more quarter round than I’ve ever seen. I can’t wait to just rip it out one day!
Yay! I am happy to report my entire house is almost completely quarter round free!!
Nothing screams “HOME DEPOT” like quarter round molding. It is simply a product to cover up lousy craftsmanship or laziness. Do it right, or don’t do it at all.
Amen!
I’m sorry, but NOT ALL QUARTER ROUND IS USED TO COVER SHODDY WORK! Wow, I find that so insulting! I live in a 120 year old Victorian with 12 inch molding on the walls at the floor. As we work to do a medium sized bathroom (with materials from Home Depot), there is no way we are going risk ruining the molding by removing it — and yes, we would ruin it, as well as the wall most likely. So, yes, we will be installing quarter round/shoe trim at the base where the wood meets the wall/baseboard. I assure you, it will not be because my husband does crappy work; rather, he does very good work, and the quarter round will simply give the room a more finished look. I understand if people don’t like quarter round — that’s simply individual taste, and we all have our own. However, to assume that all quarter round is there simply to hide shoddy workmanship is just unfair and snobby.
No need to be sorry. You’re entitled to your opinion, just as I’m entitled to mine. Have a good day!
Its called shoe… wtf is wrong with you people. All i see is a bunch of people who watch too much hgtv and think theyre all of the sudden expert finish carpenters. Maybe if it would have occoured to you to use a flat bar it wouldnt look like you removed all that base and shoe with a hatchet. Learn to cope your inside corners. Quarter round is literally a quarter of a circle, both sides are the same width, standard shoe is 3/4″ high and projects out 1/2″.
1/4 round looks very nice in older homes with original woodwork or plaster molding type of homes. I have done a couple of my homes circa 1845 and 1915 that looked great with quarter round. Preserving the architecture is the point of them or adding them. We buy older homes for the quality and character of the homes. My current house and project is circa 1952 mid-century modern with floor to ceiling windows throughout and I will not be using 1/4 round. I am actually trying to remove it in the kitchen as we speak. My kitchen has wood cabinets and tile flooring and it just does not go with the style. I personally think that real wood must be used at all times unless it is an apt or rental space. I see some of those faux wood doors in pictures which I dislike. They are like styrofoam and the mouldings like that are also not pleasing IMO. I am disappointed with those that brag about something that is great because it is new. I can buy new Chinet plates at the store but they still will never be as beautiful as my China that has been handed down through my family. If you own a Colonial or Victorian or Craftsman home then fill it with beautiful quality furnishings and trimmings BUT if you have a contemporary home then you can do the minimalist look. If you do minimalist or cheap with the former then you just look house poor or you lack creativity. You can always look at salvage and flea markets etc…
I like to use Plinth blocks too! they make molding to door trim transition look so much better.
I just came across this and agree with the quarter round issue. What method is the best to remove baseboard before putting new flooring down, though? If I am going to go to the trouble of removing the base board, I don’t want it to be broken in the process!!
So this is not smart girl DIY. I say this because, if you were smart, you would know some hardwood floors require a very large gap at the edge of the room for expansion. Equations for hardwood looks like this. You calculate moisture content (MC) for your area by the type of wood coeffecient (CC) by the size of each board and then calculate that for your room. For example, a 2% MC x .00365 CC (redwood) x 3.25 (board size x a 30 foot wide room = a 2.5 inch expansion requirement to ensure you do not create buckling in the floor.
There are no moldings/baseboards that come in a standard 1.25 inch width. It doesn’t happen unless you have a specialty lumber location nearby or have custom made baseboards. Most baseboards come in a 9/16 width or less. So for those people living in places not relegated to the size of a box, you must use quarter round to cover an expansion gap for hardwood floors. The repercussion of not installing at the correct gap length is way more expensive and looks WAY worse then installing a quarter round base to your molding.
I say this for a few reasons but the main one is, this is supposed to be “smart” diy, right? That’s the name of your website… In no location did you talk about expansion gaps, reasons for maintaining a quarter round shoe (other than doing it so you like the way it looks), or a litany of other reasons a shoe is important to maintain on your baseboards. Don’t get me wrong, your house looks like it had shoddy work throughout, and that it was a stepped install with some cut corners that created less than ideal workmanship. However, a rant on quarter round for “visual” only purposes is a HUGE disservice to DIY’er’s learning.
The purpose of the quarter round at the floor to baseboard is to hide gaps between the floor and the baseboard. That happens because the floor is uneven. If you ignore that, and simply follow the line of the floor, you’ll see ‘sloping’ baseboards.
There are two solutions.
The first is to do what I normally do in homes, run a level baseboard and hide the gap between floor and baseboard using quarter round. This is a quicker approach and is what a lot of pros do when working with older homes.
The second solution is what homeowners should do when cost isn’t an issue and they are doing the work for themselves. That is, buy an oversized board (so if your baseboard is 3 1/2″ you’d buy a “6” board). You place that board on the floor and scribe it to the floor profile. You cut along that profile you just scribed. Now you cut down the opposite edge of the board so that it measures 3 1/2″ at it’s widest point.
The result will be a baseboard that looks level and avoids the use of quarter round to hide gaps.
It is more time consuming and much more expensive. Hence the reason more carpenters don’t do in when working on spec. It’s why I don’t do it. Home buyers don’t pay me for it.
That said, you’re right to not like it. It is a half way measure. I love your idea of painting the steps different colors by the way. Fantastic and unexpected. Keep up your good work!!