Wall panelling - which style to use in an old house?

[Housego]

We are looking to add panelling to one wall of our sitting room to cover up a poor condition (cosmetically) wall. The house is a rural cottage, with high ceilings and large rooms, dating from about 1900, there aren’t many original features and it isn’t of an obvious period. We want floor to ceiling and not tongue and groove - we have that half height in the cloakroom and a corridor, which was here when me moved in and we like, but with the high ceilings could look too much full height and we want something maybe more formal looking in the sitting room.

Any ideas please? I know that it is currently in fashion but we are looking for something that won’t date and will look appropriate in our house. I have looked at this, for example: www.skirting4u.co.uk/mdf-wall-panelling-strips

Are you wanting to cover over the whole wall or just put some wooden trim on to distract the eye?

If you cover it then you might have issues with damp if it is an external wall.

This is also why I think using MDF would be a bad idea.

Agreed! The walls need to 'breathe' or moisture gets trapped. Maybe there was cement-rich render on the outside or inside.
Check out the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings for advice. Actually, SPAB advice is for all historic buildings.

The whole wall but it’s internal and was added by the previous owners within the last 10 years to divide a room.

We are very aware of potential damp issues on external walls, due to having to deal with with it because of things that have been done prior to us buying the house!

Bumping - does anybody have any suggestions please?

So it is to distract the eye rather than cover the wall? I like the style you have already found. We did a fancier style because we have high ceilings with a picture rail. We bought some wooden beading and then glued it to the wall in rectangles, a longer one at the top and smaller one at the bottom. It looks like it was put in when the house was built.

@Housego Traditional wainscotting was added to walls on battening in order to allow older walls to breathe - it was used for that purpose and to cover imperfections. If you do not want t&g there are plenty of other types of panelling style. If you have high ceilings I would still be tempted to put it only 3/4 up the walls - to picture rail height.

If you use battens, you may be able to use MDF as there will be airflow behind it.

I think the style you’ve linked above is very modern. It’s plain with no detailing which suits the current Ikea aesthetic but is unlike what you’d have seen 100+ years ago which would have more intricate detailing.

Something like this?
https://wallpanelsworld.co.uk/classic-mdf-wall-panelling-kit/

We live in a 1920s house and have panelling in the dining room & hall way (pics below).
It's only halfway up the walls. I suspect fully panelled walls or rooms would only have been the norm in very grand properties like Manor Houses, so it may possibly be a bit out of keeping if you want to be sympathetic to the original period?

Thanks all. Ideally, I would like to hide the whole wall as it’s a poor quality flimsy thin one put in by the previous owners about 5 years ago, to divide a room - the original walls are about 3 foot thick. Damp isn’t an issue on this wall because it’s internal and modern. We can be relatively flexible on style because the house isn’t of a particular period, it’s kind of evolved over time, with different aged additions and few original features but I want anything that we add to look like it could have been original. I wouldn’t describe the house as grand but it is big, with large rooms, high ceilings and large windows - rural cottage was maybe not the best description - so it could take a whole wall being panelled, I think.

I like the link from Chersfrozenface - thanks, I may consider something more like that.

MissAtomicBomb1 - I love your photos and is definitely something that I would consider otherwise. It will be on a single wall behind a sofa too, which would cover most of that.

Good luck with choosing!
Not for the faint hearted, but we've got anaglypta hiding our terrible ceilings. I quite like it!

@Housego Some traditional full height style panels for you.

We have this in a back room of a 1908 house (it’s even more ornate in the front room).