Captain Caulk Saves the Day

So, we hung some molding. Rather than buy a bunch of new molding, we reused the original molding from our house and reconfigured it to fit the new shape of the room. Here’s how it turned out:

Doesn’t look too good, does it? It appears as though the wood is covered with holes and there’s also a gap between the molding and the wall on the right hand side. Well, the wood is covered with holes from nailing the molding to the wall. Here’s another attempt at installing molding:

Again, it doesn’t look too good. See the gap where the two pieces meet? That could look better. How to fix it? Caulk is the answer. Lots and lots of caulk.

You can either apply caulk with your fingers or with a caulk gun. I used both. Here I am using a caulk gun.


You just pull the trigger on the caulk gun and out squirts the caulk into the gaps/holes in the molding. Then run your finger over the bead of caulk to smooth it out and mush it into the gap. Finally, wipe off any excess with a rag. It’s really very easy to do.

Now, applying caulk with your finger works well in tight spots where the tip of the caulk gun might not fit. Pull the trigger on the caulk gun and load up your finger. Like this:


Then run your caulk-covered finger over the gaps or holes you’re trying to fill.

It’s messy. You’re hands will be full of caulk. Luckly, it washes off with soap, water and a little scrubbing.

Now here’s the “Before Caulk” picture:

And the “After Caulk” picture:

Before Caulk:

After Caulk:

So, as you can see, caulk can hide many of your molding flaws. It’s worth doing, unless you hang molding and trim like a pro and have no flaws to hide.

Here’s a few key points: 1) Make sure you’re using painter’s caulk, which can be painted. 2) Make sure you wipe off any excess with a rag ASAP. Otherwise your trim and moulding will look goopy. 3) Apply the caulk after you’ve hung the molding and primed it. 4) Once the caulk is dry, paint the molding. Make sure you’re covering all the caulk with paint or else it will dry out and look like crap.

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