What are some good and thorough resources for putting trim in a house?

December 6, 2014 8:24 PM

There are plenty of basic and rudimentary how-tos out there that focus on pretty straightforward situations, like putting shoe/quarter-round molding along a straight wall or around a corner. I'm wondering about more complex situations: trim around or at doorways, dealing with existing moldings, or dealing with transitions, staircases, etc.

We had a guy come in and put down the basic flooring when we bought our house but he did none of the trim and after 3 years I'm finally getting around to it. I'm now realizing he didn't do the best of jobs around some of the corners so I'm probably going to have to do a fair amount of careful trim to cover it up.

Here are some of the situations I'm hoping to be able to deal with:

• open doorways with fluted columns that go all the way to the floor
• need to add a transition between natural linoleum and top of wood steps (a transition down of around 1/4-3/8 inch)
• top landing of the stairs currently trimmed with a metal strip, would like to replace with actual wood trim
• installing transition between tile floor and wooden floor
• bottom of stairs may have had trim at one point, but it was ripped out when entire house was carpeted (by whoever flipped house & sold to prior owner)
• somewhat more basic, but a simple rubric for calculating correct cuts for corners that aren't 90° would be helpful too

There must be a good book on trim out there geared towards beginners like myself, but I haven't found it yet. And I'd honestly prefer a book (heavily illustrated) to an online website if possible. Something that I can just take with me when working on a room.

posted by Deathalicious to Home & Garden (5 answers total)

Tauton Press and their Fine Homebuilding magazine is all you'll need. They have videos and subject-specific books of collected articles. I'm pretty sure I have one that is interior trim specifically.
posted by humboldt32 at 8:48 PM on December 6, 2014 [1 favorite]

There is a tool that looks like a bunch of needles/pins tethered close together. They move back and forth so pushing this against fluting or molding gives you an outline so you can scribe/saw/file whatever you are installing to fit exactly. I have seen it used by carpenters and flooring mechanics, but I am sorry that I do not know its name.
posted by Cranberry at 12:16 AM on December 7, 2014 [1 favorite]

Humboldt32 beat me to the Taunton Press recommendation. You'll probably need an undercut saw along with the usual miter saw and pin nailer, etc. It's a lot easier if you are going to be painting the trim, because caulk and paint hide all flaws, than if you are keeping it bare wood, of course.
posted by Dip Flash at 6:16 AM on December 7, 2014

Learn how to cope corners from YouTube. You kind of have to see it Done to understand how it work. It'll fix all your not-quite-90degree corner issues.
posted by fshgrl at 12:10 PM on December 7, 2014

Response by poster: I am planning on bare wood but am not a perfectionist. My plan was to just fill in minor holes, etc. with a bit of wood filler and leave it at that. The basic color scheme is light wood (bamboo).
posted by Deathalicious at 7:05 PM on December 7, 2014