Fabrication 01: Making a Wall Rose.

A 'rose' is a plaster or wooden moulding which serves a decorative and practical purpose. They are most often found in conjuction with lighting; and the base of a ceiling mounted pendant light, is called a rose. In this post I will reveal the purpose and process of making a wall rose from scratch.

The practical purpose of the rose is to conceal the wiring for the light. A decorative rose can be placed behind the light for this reason also. In addition they provide a solid mounting surface, if the background is unstable.

I was called to mount some replacement wall lights, and upon removing the old lights and their roses, the wall was crumbling, and the wiring messy. The new lights couldn't be fitted because of the mass of wiring, and the chalk-like, crumbling plaster.

A victorian style wall mounted light fitting, with small disco ball hanging. Mounted on beige walls

Wiring with a cable joiner fixed to the ends protrudes from a beige wall

Here we can see the old light, and the wall behind it. The mass of cables had been concealed in the old rose. Therefore I recommended that the customer have some new roses made that matched the new lights. I volunteered to make them.

I have cut circles many times, using a jigsaw, and using a router, for a number of applications. However, this needed to be quick and economical. So I started thinking, and even though it hurt, I found the solution. I remembered that my Bosch palm router had a detachable edge guide. This guide could be further dismantled leaving only a rail sticking out. Then I could put a screw through it into the work peice, providing a centre pivot for the circle cut. However, this wouldn't prevent the router from wandering in and out, providing an uneven circumference. I mulled over this but it hurt too much. I thought of gluing a mending plate to the position of the pivot, but to my delight my eye lighted upon a washer just laying about in my unit. Wow, perfect.

Router power tool, upside down, undergoing modification on a workbench.

Ruler calibrating modifications to handheld mini power router. Tool case visible on workbenc.

Power drill and hot melt glue gun on bench with other miscellaneous items

Hand holding metal work between thumb and forefinger. washer fixed to bar. Case items on desk

Palm router upended, in the process of attaching a jig enabling circular cuts. Items workbench

Router on i's head with edge guide attached

Now I had a working jig that can cut any size radius on the length of the rail. After one test cut the washer started to move so I glued it back with plenty more hot glue. I traced out each rose using the router cutting just micro-millimetres. After roughly sawing away excess from the circumference, I set the router in place again and performed the final cuts.

Router with jig on mdf board showing traced circular cut-out. Holes drilled in board. workshop floor

Palm router circle cutting jig on hexagonal board with larger board on workbench tools scattered.

Circle cutout fixed to cutting board. Tools and dust scattered on workbench

I sanded down the three discs then ran a cove pattern cutter around them to finish the job.

Next day I took them to the job and finished the install. The width of the rose enabled me to cover the choc-blox, and get a good fixing to more stable parts of the wall.

A circular-cut piece of board . Power router and hand tools on dusty bench in a workshop.

New light fitting installed with pre-fab. wall rose. White wall inbackground.

Perspective of bronze lighting socket armature on unpainted wall rose.

This task was satisfying and the result quite neat and endearing. When working as a carpenter who has an interest in joinery and fabrication, you have to compete with joinery shops. This means recognising opportunities more suited to the small workshop. basically at E.H.S we are not going to build bespoke doors for customers, or run off many meters of skirting board. What suits us is to make up a small replica of something, or one replacement component to a wooden article. We can and have produced a few meters of skirting for one customer.

It's something I enjoy doing so as long as I'm working for this business you'll always be able to get quaint little feats of creativity like this from E.H.S.

Tom Rutland,

E.H.S.