Ceilings: History and Purpose
A ceiling is the overhead surface or surfaces above a area, and the underside of a floor or a roof. Ceilings are mostly utilized to conceal floor and roof construction. They have been favourite places for decorating from the earliest times: either in painting the plain surface, in bringing out the structural members of roof or floor, or by commandeering it as a space for an allover pattern of relief.
Little is proved of ancient Greek ceilings, but Roman ceilings were rich with relief and painting, as is evidenced within the vault soffits of Pompeian baths. In the Gothic period, the widespread trend to utilize structural aspects decoratively then came to the design of the beamed ceiling, in which sizeable cross-girders support smaller floor beams at right angles to them, beams and girders being strongly chamfered and molded and generally painted in decorative colours.
In the Renaissance, ceiling design was evolved to its highest pitch of individuality and differentiation. Three options were further developed. The first was the coffered ceiling, in the complex design of which the Italian Renaissance architects far emulated their Roman prototypes. Circular, square, octagonal, and L-shaped coffers abounded, with their edges richly carved and the field of each coffer flourished with a rosette. The second form consisted of ceilings largely or partially vaulted, usually with arched intersections, with painted bands emphasizing the architectural design and with pictures filling the remainder of the area. The loggia of the Farnesina villa in Rome, decorated by Raphael and Giulio Romano, is a great example of this. In the Baroque period, mystical figures in heavy relief, scrolls, cartouches, and garlands were also used to decorate ceilings of this form. The Pitti Palace in Florence and many French ceilings in the Louis XIV style illustrate this. In the third sort, which was especially found of Venice, the ceiling became a sizeable framed picture, like in the Doges’ Palace.
In modern architecture ceilings can be split into two major varieties — the suspended (or hung) ceiling and the exposed ceiling. With ceilings hung at some distance under the structural members, some architects have sought to conceal super amounts of mechanical and electrical equipment, such as electrical conduits, air-conditioning ducts, water pipes, sewage lines, and lighting fixtures. Most suspended ceilings feature a lightweight metal grid suspended from the structure by wires or rods to hold up plasterboard sheets or acoustical tiles.
Other architects, featuring the aesthetic of the exposed structural system, take pleasure in showcasing the mechanical and electrical equipment. Due to this desire, many structural systems have been developed that have a deliberate power in themselves and become popular ceilings.
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