January 31, 2024 • 11 mins
Wainscoting is a beloved and time-tested decorative way to spruce up your walls. But what is it anyway? Listen in to find out.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:04):
Hey, and welcome to the Short Stuff. I'm Josh, and
there's Chuck and Jerry's you're sending for Dave. So this
is short stuff.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
Let's go scoot scoot scoot.
Speaker 3 (00:14):
Sure, all right, inside joke everyone, we're talking about what
I call Wayne scotting today. Apparently you can also pronounce
it Wayne's coating. I've always said Wayne Scotting, and evidently
either one of them are just fine.
Speaker 1 (00:29):
I saw also people in Chumley and Hayesbro pronounce it
wookie cat.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
Well look it up.
Speaker 3 (00:37):
Okay, if you don't know what we're talking about, we'll
tell you right off the bat that Wayne scotting is
a design feature. It's been around for several hundred years.
And if you've ever been in a house and you
walk into let's say the dining room and instead of
the entire wall being let's say dry wall, maybe about
(01:00):
halfway down or I think the general rule is what
two thirds of the way down waist height, you will fine.
And you know it depends on the height of your wall,
though really, because you would you want to do it
different for like a ten foot ceiling than.
Speaker 2 (01:16):
Like an eight foot seriling.
Speaker 1 (01:17):
Quite a setup, it is.
Speaker 3 (01:19):
But if from there down you see like you know,
these any kind of wood paneling or these these wood stripes,
paneling board something like that. Not the rail itself. We'll
get to that. That is what Wayne scotting is.
Speaker 1 (01:34):
Yeah, it turns out it's harder to explain than you'd think.
Speaker 2 (01:36):
You know, I didn't think it was until I got going.
Speaker 1 (01:39):
First. Of all, that space that's waist height down on
the wall is called the dotto. So Wayne scotting basically
covers the dotto. If you had paneling that went all
the way to say, the ceiling, that's just called paneling typically,
So that's one aspect of Wayne scotting that usually is universal.
It's about waist height, okay, yeah, and then it's often
(02:01):
made of wood, but sometimes it's made to look like
it's made of wood. It could just be raised quarter
round or other kinds of molding, cut at forty five
degree angles and fashion into a square, a hollow square,
and put in repetition on the wall and put a
molding at the top and a molding at the bottom,
(02:21):
painted all one color that's a different color from the
wall above it. You've got fau Wayne scotting as a
DIY weekend project?
Speaker 2 (02:29):
Can I stop all the carpenters from writing a letter?
Speaker 1 (02:32):
Oh gosh, did I say something wrong.
Speaker 2 (02:34):
I think it's to be I think it would have
to be half round.
Speaker 1 (02:37):
Yeah. I was hoping that people wouldn't pick up on
that because I thought it as I was saying it.
But I'm glad you corrected me to keep from emails.
Speaker 3 (02:45):
Yeah, I mean that's one way you can do it
is literally individual strips of board. Much more commonly these days.
You can buy this stuff in large four by eight
sheets that are already grooved to look like those individual strips.
Much much easier, and it's a it's a not too
hard DIY project. I've done it plenty of times and
it really can really yeah, yeah, it's really easy. Uh well,
(03:08):
we'll get to when it's not easy. But you know,
if you can cut something to fit a wall and
you have like a what are those things called that
you get like cocking out of a tube with a
cock gun gun, Yeah, then then you can do that
some liquid nails, maybe even a little nails shooter.
Speaker 1 (03:28):
Yeah, a little finishing nail gun.
Speaker 2 (03:31):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (03:31):
It's just it's as easy as that. It's really not hard.
The word itself. I think by the time the late
fifteen hundreds rolled around was a verb meaning to line
boards with paneling from uh supposedly maybe a middle Dutch
or low German wagen shot.
Speaker 1 (03:49):
That I really like. It's dining room feels much more
formal thanks to the wagon shot you've installed here? Is
that a d why vagus job? You said?
Speaker 2 (04:01):
Then you get head over the head of the purse.
Speaker 1 (04:03):
That's right.
Speaker 2 (04:03):
And someone says, I never.
Speaker 1 (04:05):
So I saw this old house, said that it's Dutch
in origin and it dates back to the thirteen hundreds,
which is it's really something and imagine that it basically
hasn't changed essentially in seven hundred plus years.
Speaker 2 (04:20):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (04:21):
And the cool thing about Waynscotting is that it's adaptable
to a bunch of different styles. I mean, you're probably
not going to see like a modern or super super
contemporary house with it. You may be able to get
away with it if it's a certain kind, but a
lot of other traditional It can go with art deco,
it can go obviously and was heavily used in the
(04:43):
Arts and crafts movement. But it's a fun way to
break up the wall. But it originally served the purpose
and still sort of does as protecting that lower wall.
Speaker 1 (04:54):
Yeah, I think that's what it was originally for, and
that still is what it does, especially if you have
molding across the top of it that kind of finishes
it and separates it from the wall above. That's frequently
referred to as a chair rail because it protects your
wall from being banged up by chairs when people slide
them slide them out to get away.
Speaker 3 (05:12):
And never knew that's what that came from. Oh really, no,
I mean I always called it chair rail. It can
also be called doto rail because what you were talking about.
But I never knew it was to protect against a chair.
I had no idea.
Speaker 2 (05:26):
I love it.
Speaker 1 (05:27):
Yeah, me too. It also technically could protect against Kramer
in his pool queue if you have a pool table
set up in a room that's too small to house
a pool table.
Speaker 2 (05:39):
That's good. Should we take a break, yes, all right,
we'll be right back.
Speaker 1 (05:44):
Softly jaw.
Speaker 2 (05:49):
So, all right.
Speaker 3 (06:05):
So there are different kinds of wayne scotting. There's bedboard
wayne scotting. You will notice those distinctive grooves, these narrow
vertical planks. That's a very common one that you can
buy in large sheets.
Speaker 1 (06:17):
That's what I thought. It was like plain and simple.
Speaker 3 (06:19):
I did too, actually, But if you throw the word
like flat panel Wayne Scotting in front of it, then
that is just another kind of smooth version. But I've
always just thought of Wayne Scotting as being the grooved.
Speaker 1 (06:32):
Yeah, the bee board. Yeah. So you said flat panel,
and you said that it's tough to get Wayne Scotting
or pull Way Scouting off into modern or contemporary house.
You can, but it has to be very sleek and minimal,
but you could do it. It's very daring. All of
your friends in the design community are going to say,
what what a daredevil, But if you pull it off,
(06:53):
they will fet you. They will have a party in
your honor for it.
Speaker 3 (06:56):
That's right, great use of fat, good word. So there's
also overlay and raised panel Wayne Scotting, and that's what
you're that's what you're gonna find more of these days,
which is a panel that you put over the wall.
And I kind of thought that's like it has always been,
but apparently back in the day it was actually recessed
and built into the wall itself.
Speaker 1 (07:16):
Yeah, so it would be even with the with the
wall above it, right, Yeah, So that raised panel, Wayne
Scouting it it it's not the best name for what
it describes, because from what I could tell, if you
have what amount to cabinet doors on your wall in
your dining room, but without handles, that would be considered
(07:37):
raised panel. Wayne Scotting. It's like a square a square panel, yeah,
with a square routed into maybe like four inches from
the top and the bottom of the sides. And then
there's that leaves another raised square in the middle of it. Right, Yeah,
that's raised panel. And I just don't it does not
(07:58):
doesn't doesn't ring with me.
Speaker 2 (08:01):
Yeah you saw it though, right, Yeah.
Speaker 1 (08:04):
I just tried to describe it, and I knew that
great of a job. But imagine like a square mot in,
like a raised panel, a raised square of wood and
there's a square moat two thirds of the way in
or a third of the way in.
Speaker 2 (08:19):
Oh my god, how about this.
Speaker 3 (08:20):
Imagine if you had one of those cutting boards that
catches the juice, yes, and you screwed it into your wall.
Speaker 1 (08:27):
Right, you just got a bunch of those and you
lined them up evenly there here you go. Let's raised panel.
Imagine this. Imagine going on the internet and searching raised
panel wings cotting and then clicking the images and looking.
Speaker 2 (08:40):
At the boy. That's great. I love it.
Speaker 3 (08:42):
Uh. It was usually oak traditionally in the past. These
days there's all kinds of other products. Obviously, you can
have MDF, which is medium density fiberboard plywood, you know,
the the in my opinion, kind of the cheap stuff
you get at the big box store looks fine because
you're gonna end up staining or painting over it. But
(09:05):
just make sure it is a stain. Great if you
are going to stain it. Otherwise it might not look great,
but you can always paint over it, which is what
we've done.
Speaker 1 (09:13):
Yeah, and that's how those the DIY version where it's
really just dry wall covered with some you know, half
round or whatever molding that forms those squares to make
it look like, uh, what is it not flat raised panels? Man,
I can't believe it. That's that's really It's not hard
(09:35):
to do or no, it's not easy to do, but
it's not super hard, especially if you already know your
way around you know, cutting tools and yeah, miter saws
and like you said, call guns and finishing nail guns.
Speaker 3 (09:47):
Yeah, if you've got if you're doing it in the
big sheets, you're you're gonna want to use a table
saw where it gets difficult. And I said earlier, you know,
it's sort of not too hard as a DIY project.
Where it does get difficult, and this is especially true
in older homes, which we found out. You know, our
house is from nineteen thirty five, so there's not a
straight wall or floor in our house barely.
Speaker 2 (10:11):
And then when you go to.
Speaker 3 (10:12):
Put this beautifully perfectly rectangular bedboard up, and then you've
got a strip that's two inches wide at the top
and it goes down to about a third of an
inch at the bottom, and you're just like, oh, my lord.
If you're good at that kind of stuff, it's not
so hard. But if that is a challenge for you
cutting something on a long, long angle like that, it
(10:34):
is a challenge for me, then it can get dispiriting,
is the word I'll use.
Speaker 1 (10:38):
I saw. What you wanted to do is you make
your chair rail even that's all level, and then the
basement you you shim and then caulk in so that
if you really look close to the baseboard, you'd be like,
oh that that part of the baseboard has a little
dip to it. And you like, get out of my house.
Speaker 2 (10:56):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (10:56):
I tried really hard to cover that up. But that's
the of diy Wayne scouting projects that call gun because
you're calling in any grooves or whatever, and then paint,
priming and paint, and then it does end up looking
like just one solid group of paneled wood. It's really
a neat thing.
Speaker 2 (11:16):
Do you know the old construction turn.
Speaker 1 (11:20):
Measured twice, cut once.
Speaker 2 (11:22):
That's a good one. Cock and paint. We'll make it
what it ain't.
Speaker 1 (11:26):
Oh nice, chuck. If that's not something to end short
Stuff on, I don't know what is.
Speaker 2 (11:32):
I think short Stuff is out. Stuff you should Know
is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts my heart Radio,
visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen
to your favorite shows.
Hey, and welcome to the Short Stuff. I'm Josh, and
there's Chuck and Jerry's you're sending for Dave. So this
is short stuff.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
Let's go scoot scoot scoot.
Speaker 3 (00:14):
Sure, all right, inside joke everyone, we're talking about what
I call Wayne scotting today. Apparently you can also pronounce
it Wayne's coating. I've always said Wayne Scotting, and evidently
either one of them are just fine.
Speaker 1 (00:29):
I saw also people in Chumley and Hayesbro pronounce it
wookie cat.
Speaker 2 (00:34):
Well look it up.
Speaker 3 (00:37):
Okay, if you don't know what we're talking about, we'll
tell you right off the bat that Wayne scotting is
a design feature. It's been around for several hundred years.
And if you've ever been in a house and you
walk into let's say the dining room and instead of
the entire wall being let's say dry wall, maybe about
(01:00):
halfway down or I think the general rule is what
two thirds of the way down waist height, you will fine.
And you know it depends on the height of your wall,
though really, because you would you want to do it
different for like a ten foot ceiling than.
Speaker 2 (01:16):
Like an eight foot seriling.
Speaker 1 (01:17):
Quite a setup, it is.
Speaker 3 (01:19):
But if from there down you see like you know,
these any kind of wood paneling or these these wood stripes,
paneling board something like that. Not the rail itself. We'll
get to that. That is what Wayne scotting is.
Speaker 1 (01:34):
Yeah, it turns out it's harder to explain than you'd think.
Speaker 2 (01:36):
You know, I didn't think it was until I got going.
Speaker 1 (01:39):
First. Of all, that space that's waist height down on
the wall is called the dotto. So Wayne scotting basically
covers the dotto. If you had paneling that went all
the way to say, the ceiling, that's just called paneling typically,
So that's one aspect of Wayne scotting that usually is universal.
It's about waist height, okay, yeah, and then it's often
(02:01):
made of wood, but sometimes it's made to look like
it's made of wood. It could just be raised quarter
round or other kinds of molding, cut at forty five
degree angles and fashion into a square, a hollow square,
and put in repetition on the wall and put a
molding at the top and a molding at the bottom,
(02:21):
painted all one color that's a different color from the
wall above it. You've got fau Wayne scotting as a
DIY weekend project?
Speaker 2 (02:29):
Can I stop all the carpenters from writing a letter?
Speaker 1 (02:32):
Oh gosh, did I say something wrong.
Speaker 2 (02:34):
I think it's to be I think it would have
to be half round.
Speaker 1 (02:37):
Yeah. I was hoping that people wouldn't pick up on
that because I thought it as I was saying it.
But I'm glad you corrected me to keep from emails.
Speaker 3 (02:45):
Yeah, I mean that's one way you can do it
is literally individual strips of board. Much more commonly these days.
You can buy this stuff in large four by eight
sheets that are already grooved to look like those individual strips.
Much much easier, and it's a it's a not too
hard DIY project. I've done it plenty of times and
it really can really yeah, yeah, it's really easy. Uh well,
(03:08):
we'll get to when it's not easy. But you know,
if you can cut something to fit a wall and
you have like a what are those things called that
you get like cocking out of a tube with a
cock gun gun, Yeah, then then you can do that
some liquid nails, maybe even a little nails shooter.
Speaker 1 (03:28):
Yeah, a little finishing nail gun.
Speaker 2 (03:31):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (03:31):
It's just it's as easy as that. It's really not hard.
The word itself. I think by the time the late
fifteen hundreds rolled around was a verb meaning to line
boards with paneling from uh supposedly maybe a middle Dutch
or low German wagen shot.
Speaker 1 (03:49):
That I really like. It's dining room feels much more
formal thanks to the wagon shot you've installed here? Is
that a d why vagus job? You said?
Speaker 2 (04:01):
Then you get head over the head of the purse.
Speaker 1 (04:03):
That's right.
Speaker 2 (04:03):
And someone says, I never.
Speaker 1 (04:05):
So I saw this old house, said that it's Dutch
in origin and it dates back to the thirteen hundreds,
which is it's really something and imagine that it basically
hasn't changed essentially in seven hundred plus years.
Speaker 2 (04:20):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (04:21):
And the cool thing about Waynscotting is that it's adaptable
to a bunch of different styles. I mean, you're probably
not going to see like a modern or super super
contemporary house with it. You may be able to get
away with it if it's a certain kind, but a
lot of other traditional It can go with art deco,
it can go obviously and was heavily used in the
(04:43):
Arts and crafts movement. But it's a fun way to
break up the wall. But it originally served the purpose
and still sort of does as protecting that lower wall.
Speaker 1 (04:54):
Yeah, I think that's what it was originally for, and
that still is what it does, especially if you have
molding across the top of it that kind of finishes
it and separates it from the wall above. That's frequently
referred to as a chair rail because it protects your
wall from being banged up by chairs when people slide
them slide them out to get away.
Speaker 3 (05:12):
And never knew that's what that came from. Oh really, no,
I mean I always called it chair rail. It can
also be called doto rail because what you were talking about.
But I never knew it was to protect against a chair.
I had no idea.
Speaker 2 (05:26):
I love it.
Speaker 1 (05:27):
Yeah, me too. It also technically could protect against Kramer
in his pool queue if you have a pool table
set up in a room that's too small to house
a pool table.
Speaker 2 (05:39):
That's good. Should we take a break, yes, all right,
we'll be right back.
Speaker 1 (05:44):
Softly jaw.
Speaker 2 (05:49):
So, all right.
Speaker 3 (06:05):
So there are different kinds of wayne scotting. There's bedboard
wayne scotting. You will notice those distinctive grooves, these narrow
vertical planks. That's a very common one that you can
buy in large sheets.
Speaker 1 (06:17):
That's what I thought. It was like plain and simple.
Speaker 3 (06:19):
I did too, actually, But if you throw the word
like flat panel Wayne Scotting in front of it, then
that is just another kind of smooth version. But I've
always just thought of Wayne Scotting as being the grooved.
Speaker 1 (06:32):
Yeah, the bee board. Yeah. So you said flat panel,
and you said that it's tough to get Wayne Scotting
or pull Way Scouting off into modern or contemporary house.
You can, but it has to be very sleek and minimal,
but you could do it. It's very daring. All of
your friends in the design community are going to say,
what what a daredevil, But if you pull it off,
(06:53):
they will fet you. They will have a party in
your honor for it.
Speaker 3 (06:56):
That's right, great use of fat, good word. So there's
also overlay and raised panel Wayne Scotting, and that's what
you're that's what you're gonna find more of these days,
which is a panel that you put over the wall.
And I kind of thought that's like it has always been,
but apparently back in the day it was actually recessed
and built into the wall itself.
Speaker 1 (07:16):
Yeah, so it would be even with the with the
wall above it, right, Yeah, So that raised panel, Wayne
Scouting it it it's not the best name for what
it describes, because from what I could tell, if you
have what amount to cabinet doors on your wall in
your dining room, but without handles, that would be considered
(07:37):
raised panel. Wayne Scotting. It's like a square a square panel, yeah,
with a square routed into maybe like four inches from
the top and the bottom of the sides. And then
there's that leaves another raised square in the middle of it. Right, Yeah,
that's raised panel. And I just don't it does not
(07:58):
doesn't doesn't ring with me.
Speaker 2 (08:01):
Yeah you saw it though, right, Yeah.
Speaker 1 (08:04):
I just tried to describe it, and I knew that
great of a job. But imagine like a square mot in,
like a raised panel, a raised square of wood and
there's a square moat two thirds of the way in
or a third of the way in.
Speaker 2 (08:19):
Oh my god, how about this.
Speaker 3 (08:20):
Imagine if you had one of those cutting boards that
catches the juice, yes, and you screwed it into your wall.
Speaker 1 (08:27):
Right, you just got a bunch of those and you
lined them up evenly there here you go. Let's raised panel.
Imagine this. Imagine going on the internet and searching raised
panel wings cotting and then clicking the images and looking.
Speaker 2 (08:40):
At the boy. That's great. I love it.
Speaker 3 (08:42):
Uh. It was usually oak traditionally in the past. These
days there's all kinds of other products. Obviously, you can
have MDF, which is medium density fiberboard plywood, you know,
the the in my opinion, kind of the cheap stuff
you get at the big box store looks fine because
you're gonna end up staining or painting over it. But
(09:05):
just make sure it is a stain. Great if you
are going to stain it. Otherwise it might not look great,
but you can always paint over it, which is what
we've done.
Speaker 1 (09:13):
Yeah, and that's how those the DIY version where it's
really just dry wall covered with some you know, half
round or whatever molding that forms those squares to make
it look like, uh, what is it not flat raised panels? Man,
I can't believe it. That's that's really It's not hard
(09:35):
to do or no, it's not easy to do, but
it's not super hard, especially if you already know your
way around you know, cutting tools and yeah, miter saws
and like you said, call guns and finishing nail guns.
Speaker 3 (09:47):
Yeah, if you've got if you're doing it in the
big sheets, you're you're gonna want to use a table
saw where it gets difficult. And I said earlier, you know,
it's sort of not too hard as a DIY project.
Where it does get difficult, and this is especially true
in older homes, which we found out. You know, our
house is from nineteen thirty five, so there's not a
straight wall or floor in our house barely.
Speaker 2 (10:11):
And then when you go to.
Speaker 3 (10:12):
Put this beautifully perfectly rectangular bedboard up, and then you've
got a strip that's two inches wide at the top
and it goes down to about a third of an
inch at the bottom, and you're just like, oh, my lord.
If you're good at that kind of stuff, it's not
so hard. But if that is a challenge for you
cutting something on a long, long angle like that, it
(10:34):
is a challenge for me, then it can get dispiriting,
is the word I'll use.
Speaker 1 (10:38):
I saw. What you wanted to do is you make
your chair rail even that's all level, and then the
basement you you shim and then caulk in so that
if you really look close to the baseboard, you'd be like,
oh that that part of the baseboard has a little
dip to it. And you like, get out of my house.
Speaker 2 (10:56):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (10:56):
I tried really hard to cover that up. But that's
the of diy Wayne scouting projects that call gun because
you're calling in any grooves or whatever, and then paint,
priming and paint, and then it does end up looking
like just one solid group of paneled wood. It's really
a neat thing.
Speaker 2 (11:16):
Do you know the old construction turn.
Speaker 1 (11:20):
Measured twice, cut once.
Speaker 2 (11:22):
That's a good one. Cock and paint. We'll make it
what it ain't.
Speaker 1 (11:26):
Oh nice, chuck. If that's not something to end short
Stuff on, I don't know what is.
Speaker 2 (11:32):
I think short Stuff is out. Stuff you should Know
is a production of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts my heart Radio,
visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen
to your favorite shows.
Stuff You Should Know News
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Chuck Bryant
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