Fitting Floor Skirting Boards

A floating floor needs a gap between the floor and the wall all around the room, called the expansion gap. It gives the floor room to move: it expands and shrinks slightly as temperature and humidity change. The floor manufacturer sets the width, which is usually roughly 8 to 10 mm. The skirting hides this gap, but it must never block it.

Skirting also protects the wall when you clean and gives the room a finished look. Fit it after painting or wallpapering if you can. That way you skip the masking tape and avoid paint running onto the new boards.

In older homes, the existing skirting is sometimes left in place and a small strip called scotia or beading is fixed in front of it to cover the expansion gap. This saves removal work, but new skirting usually looks neater.

The right board depends on the type of floor, the room and whether you will ever want to take the skirting off again.

• Plastic (PVC) skirting copes well with moisture and is easy to keep clean. It suits hallways, kitchens and vinyl floors. Many profiles have a channel for a cable.
• MDF skirting comes foil-wrapped to match laminate or primed ready for painting. It looks more solid, but it does not like water, so keep it out of bathrooms.
• Solid wood or veneered skirting goes well with wooden floors. You can sand it and repaint or re-oil it.
• Metal skirting appears mostly in modern, minimalist interiors.

There are three common ways to fix it:

• Adhesive is quick and clean, but it needs a flat, sound and clean wall. Glued skirting often gets damaged when you remove it.
• Clips are screwed to the wall and the skirting clicks onto them. You can then lift the boards off easily when you decorate or change the floor.
• Screws or nails hold the board most firmly. This method is used mainly for timber skirting and in places that take more knocks.

The fitter first checks that the expansion gap is clear all the way round and that no spacers or bits of underlay are left in it. Then the bottom of the wall is cleaned of dust and loose plaster, and a straight edge shows where the wall bulges or dips.

Next comes measuring each run and cutting. Internal and external corners are usually mitred at 45 degrees. Where the walls are not square, the angle is adjusted to suit. The alternative is plastic corner and joint pieces, which hide a less precise cut. At door frames and transitions to another floor, the board ends with an end cap or meets a threshold profile.

The skirting is always fixed to the wall, never to the floor. Its bottom edge should only rest lightly on the floor without pressing down on it. Finally, on white or painted boards, the gap along the top edge is filled with paintable acrylic caulk. On foil-wrapped boards, caulk goes on only where the look needs it, in a colour that matches the board.

The shape of the room has the biggest effect on how long the work takes. A rectangular room with one door is simple. A hallway with lots of doors, alcoves, chimney breasts and radiator pipes means many short pieces and precise cuts.

• Uneven old plaster makes gluing harder and often needs more fixings or extra caulk.
• Solid concrete or brick is slower to drill than plasterboard, while plasterboard needs suitable cavity fixings.
• Removing old glued skirting can pull off pieces of plaster that then need repairing.
• Unfinished timber skirting still has to be painted or oiled.
• An empty room goes faster than a furnished home.

A handy homeowner can manage skirting on clips. Before you drill, find out where electrical cables and pipes run, especially below sockets and near radiators. A cable and pipe detector greatly reduces the risk of hitting something.

1. Check that the expansion gap is clear and remove the fitting spacers.
2. Clean the bottom of the wall of dust and loose plaster.
3. Measure each run and plan where the corners and joints will go.
4. Mark the clip positions according to the manufacturer's instructions, usually roughly every 40 to 60 cm and always close to corners and ends.
5. Drill the holes, insert wall plugs and screw on the clips so they do not sit on the floor.
6. Cut the boards with a mitre saw or in a mitre box, testing the cut on an offcut first.
7. Click the boards onto the clips, working from the corner towards the middle of the wall.
8. Fit the corner pieces, joints and end caps.
9. Wipe the boards clean and caulk the top gap if needed.

In practice it often happens that the skirting is pressed down onto the floor or even screwed into it. The floor then cannot move, and in warm or humid weather it starts to lift and ripple. Hard filler or silicone pushed into the expansion gap causes the same problem.

• Inaccurate corner cuts leave a visible gap that caulk only partly hides.
• Too few clips or too little adhesive lets the board pull away from the wall over time.
• Adhesive does not hold on a dusty or greasy wall.
• Joints placed at random in the middle of a wall catch the eye, so put them where they are less visible.
• Fitting before painting means paint on the skirting and an uneven paint line.

• The skirting holds firmly and does not move or gap when pressed lightly
• The bottom edge rests on the floor without pressing down on it
• The expansion gap is not filled with caulk or silicone
• Corners and joints meet without visible gaps
• Ends at door frames and floor transitions are capped or neatly finished
• The top gap against the wall is evenly caulked with no smears
• There are no scratches, adhesive residue or dust on the boards or the wall