Architecture / Skin / Wall

skin / wall / alcove
skin / wall / batten
skin / wall / bay
skin / wall / bracket
skin / wall / buttress
skin / wall / cladding
skin / wall / clapboard
skin / wall / coping
skin / wall / corbel
skin / wall / corner
skin / wall / cornice
skin / wall / curtain wall
skin / wall / finish
skin / wall / frame
skin / wall / jetty
skin / wall / lintel
skin / wall / modillion
skin / wall / niche
skin / wall / opening
skin / wall / panel
skin / wall / parapet
skin / wall / partition
skin / wall / pediment
skin / wall / pilaster
skin / wall / plate
skin / wall / property
skin / wall / quoin
skin / wall / retaining
skin / wall / siding
skin / wall / spandrel
skin / wall / tie
skin / wall / veneer
skin / wall / wainscot
skin / wall / wall

skin / wall / alcove

• tokobashira: The visible nonstructural post which marks one of the front sides of a toko-no-ma.
• tokonoma: Alcove for seating or for display (e.g. prints, flower-pot, etc.) in a Japanese room.
• toko-no-ma: An alcove having a raised floor, located in the most formal room of a traditional Japanese-style residence; used to display a hanging, scroll, small objects, a flower arrangement, etc.

skin / wall / batten

• baston: A torus. 2. A batten.
• baton: A batten.
• batoon: A batten.
• batten: From French, baton; and from Latin, bastum, “stick.” A narrow strip of wood used to cover and seal a joint or crack. 2. A length of metal pipe hung from the gridiron, for suspending scenery or equipment, as drop scenes, flats, or lighting units. Also called pipe batten. 3. A small board or strip of wood used for various building purposes, as to cover joints between boards, support shingles or roofing tiles, or provide a base for lathing.
• battening: Narrow battens or wood strips attached to a wall for the purpose of receiving lath and plaster.
• cleat: A strip of wood fastened to a surface to serve as a batten, or as a support for another board, such as a shelf.
• ledge batten: The top or bottom batten securing the vertical boards of a batten door.
• panel strip: A narrow piece of metal, or molded wood, or batten, to cover a joint between two sheathing boards, so that several will thereby form panels; or one between a style and a panel, forming a secondary or accessory panel, as in elaborate patterns of paneling. 2. A strip running in each direction of a two-way slab, within which moments per foot are assumed to be constant.
• strapped wall: See battened wall.

skin / wall / bay

• bay: A unit of a building facade, defined by a regular spacing of windows, columns, or piers.
• bays: Internal compartments of a building; each divided from the other by subtle means such as the boundaries implied by divisions marked in the side walls (columns, pilasters, etc.) or the ceiling (beams, etc.). Also external divisions of a building by fenestration (windows).
• bowed bays: Bays the face of which is an arc in plan projecting from the wall.
• cant bay: A bay erected on a plan of canted outline.
• case bay: Also see case-bay.
• case-bay: Also see case-bay.
• reverse bay: Section of architecture which projects back from the main body of a building.
• tail bay: A bay or division of a roof or floor, except a tail bay, comprising two principals with the joists or purlins between them.
• term: Also see terminal figure. 2. See terminus.
• traviated: Having a series of transverse divisions or bays, as in a ceiling.

skin / wall / bracket

• angle bracket: A bracket employed in or for a corner or angle; specifically, one which is set in a reentrant or at a salient angle of a wall, in the plane which bisects the angle of the corner.
• brackets: A support element under eaves, shelves or other overhangs; often more decorative than functional.
• ch’iao ti: A bracket, at right angles to a column, usually structural, providing extra support for lintels, but may be merely a decorative wood-carved grille.
• console bracket: The enscrolled bracket that supports many a Renaissance and neo-Renaissance cornice. Also, cornice bracket.
• cornice bracket: These are brackets that hold the cornice in place. Modillions hold up the corona, and are sometimes used on cornices as well. The brackets are often paired.
• cove bracketing: The series of brackets or frames prepared and set to receive the laths for a cove, as in a coved ceiling.
• coved bracket: A concave bracket.
• cut bracket: A bracket-shaped piece of board used either as a shelf support or true bracket; or as an ornament, as under the projecting end nosings of the treads in an open-string stair. This latter finish is common in “Colonial” houses in the U.S.
• diagonal brackets: Brackets in a diagonal pattern resembling a triangle.
• lookouts: Short wooden brackets or cantilevers that support an overhanging portion of a roof. Also, short brackets for connecting the tails of rafters to the side of the house, thereby providing a nailing surface for the soffit.
• ogee timber bracket: A heavy, S-shaped bracket.
• parotides: Same as ancon.
• parotis: Same as ancon.
• post bracket : A projection at the top of a post.
• rough bracket: A bracket under stair steps, fastened to the supporting carriage.
• scroll brackets: A bracket with a free-flowing profile that may be complete or broken.
• step bracket: A bracket form, carved or sawn, for ornamenting the end of a step in an open-string stair.
• step brackets: A bracket form, carved or sawn, for ornamenting the end of a step in an open-string stair.
• wall bracket: A source of artificial light on a side wall.

skin / wall / buttress

• abamurus: A block of masonry, in buttress form, for the support of a structure.
• ammortizement: The sloping top of a buttress or projecting pier of any sort, usually built so that the rain water shall not injure the joints.
• amortissement: The sloping top of a buttress or projecting pier of any sort, usually built so that the rain water shall not injure the joints.
• amortizement: A sloping top on a buttress or projecting pier to shed rainwater.
• angle buttress: One of two buttresses at right angles to each other, forming the corner of a structure.
• anterides: In ancient architecture, the buttresses of a wall.
• anteridos: Buttress, counter-fort, erisma, sperone, or spur supporting or strengthening a wall. 2. Type of anta or pilaster, called sperone, resembling a lesene.
• anteris: Buttress, counter-fort, erisma, sperone, or spur supporting or strengthening a wall. 2. Type of anta or pilaster, called sperone, resembling a lesene.
• appuy: Base, support, buttress, or cill. It commonly refers to the narrower (because of the level to throw off water) top part of the allege forming the cill. 2. Hand rail.
• arc-boutant: A flying buttress.
• arch buttant: Also see flying buttress.
• arch buttress: Also see flying buttress.
• arched butment: Also see flying buttress.
• arched buttress: Also see flying buttress.
• blocking buttress: A type of buttress used in medieval church.
• boterasse: A vertical structure of heavy masonry or wood applied as reinforcement to the wall of a building. Can serve a structural or decorative purpose.
• botrasse: A vertical structure of heavy masonry or wood applied as reinforcement to the wall of a building. Can serve a structural or decorative purpose.
• botress: A vertical structure of heavy masonry or wood applied as reinforcement to the wall of a building. Can serve a structural or decorative purpose.
• boutant: Type of support. An arc-boutant, or flying buttress, serves to sustain a vault, and is self-sustained by some strong wall or massive work. A pillar boutant is a large chain or jamb of stone, made to support a wall, terrace, or vault. The word is French, and comes from the verb bouter, “to butt” or “abut”.[3]
• buttress: A vertical structure of heavy masonry or wood applied as reinforcement to the wall of a building. Can serve a structural or decorative purpose.
• buttress pier: A pier acting as a buttress by receiving lateral thrusts. 2. The part of a buttress which rises above the point of thrust of a vault.
• buttress tower: A tower which flanks an arched entrance and acts, or appears to act, as a buttress.
• clasping: See buttress.
• counterfort: In masonry structures, a buttress, spur wall, pier, or projecting portion, extending upward from the foundation or from the inner face of a basement, abutment, or retaining wall to provide additional resistance to thrust.
• diagonal buttress: One extending at 45 degrees from the right-angle corner of two walls.
• domed corner buttresses: Buttress on a corner with a domed shape to it.
• erisma: A buttress or shoring to support a wall.
• flying buttress: An inclined bar of masonry carried on a segmental arch and transmitting an outward and downward thrust from a roof or vault to a solid buttress that through its mass transforms the thrust into a vertical one.
• gablets: Triangular terminations to buttresses, much in use in the Early English and Decorated periods, after which the buttresses generally terminated in pinnacles. The Early English gablets are generally plain, and very sharp in pitch. In the Decorated period they are often enriched with paneling and crockets. They are sometimes finished with small crosses, but more often with finials.
• hanging buttress: In later Gothic architecture and derivatives, a freestanding vertical rib or buttress which is supported from a wall by a corbel rather than by its own foundation.
• hanging-buttress: Not a true buttress, but put there to maintain a sequence or series, and carried on a corbel. It might also help in the construction of a vault, and in such a case will have elements responding to the ribs.
• off-set: Top of a wall, buttress, etc., created where the wall or buttress above is smaller, usually appearing as a sloping ledge in medieval buttresses or plinths, and called weather-table.
• pier buttress: A pier which receives the thrust of a flying buttress.
• pinnacle: A vertical pointed feature, of stone or brick, employed to weight a buttress or a wall in Gothic architecture.
• pinnacles: A vertical pointed feature, of stone or brick, employed to weight a buttress or a wall in Gothic architecture.
• ratchement: Curved member resembling a flying buttress rising from the corner uprights of a hearse, meeting a similar member at a central upright. Ratchements supported the hangings, valancing, and palls, and often carried prickets for candles.
• ratchment: Curved member resembling a flying buttress rising from the corner uprights of a hearse, meeting a similar member at a central upright. Ratchements supported the hangings, valancing, and palls, and often carried prickets for candles.
• Scotch crown: The peculiar termination of the tower of S. Giles’s Church at Edinburgh, consisting of eight pinnacles, from each of which a sloping bar carried on a half arch and resembling a flying buttress rises, the whole eight meeting in the middle and supporting a central pinnacle. The term is applied to other terminations of towers in which only four sloping bars occur; and this form is not peculiar to Scotland. It occurs in S. Dunstan’s in East London, and elsewhere.
• semiarch: An arch having only one half of its sweep developed, as in a flying buttress.
• semi-arch: An arch having only one half of its sweep developed, as in a flying buttress.
• set off buttress: A type of buttress.
• setback buttress: A buttress near but not at the corner of a building.
• set-off: Top of a wall, buttress, etc., created where the wall or buttress above is smaller, usually appearing as a sloping ledge in medieval buttresses or plinths, and called weather-table. Same as offset.
• sperone: A buttress.
• spheroni: Wall buttresses; anterides.
• spur: An appendage to a supporting structure, as a shore, prop, or buttress; a decorative appendage of the base of a round column resting on a square or polygonal plinth, set at the corners, and taking the form of a grotesque, a tongue, or leafwork. Also called a griffe. 2. A spere.
• straining arch: An arch used as a strut, as in a flying buttress.
• thrust: The outward force exerted by an arch or a vault that must be counterbalanced by buttresses.
• volute buttress: Volutes that taper as they rise, sometimes used to support a stepped gable.
• Wandpfeiler: Literally a wall-pier or -column, the term is given to internal buttresses forming the walls of side-chapels or pierced with arches to form aisles in South-German Baroque churches, especially those of the Voralberg School (e.g. Thumb’s Obermarchtal).

skin / wall / cladding

• brick cladding: Methods by which bricks are coursed to constitute a system organized by patterns.
• cladding: A term used to describe the siding or materials covering the exterior of a building. 2. The process or product of bonding one metal to another, usually to protect the inner metal from corrosion.
• clapboard cladding: A long, narrow board with one edge thicker than the other, overlapped to cover the outer walls of frame structures; also known as weatherboard.
• glass cladding: Spanels and spandrels and opaque sheets that are brittle and more expensive than porcelain. Glass provided more vivid colors than did stone. Vitrolite was the name for one product, but several other projects with similar composition went by other names.
• masonry cladding: Materials such as stone, brick and adobe used for facing.
• shingle cladding: As cladding, a shingle is a wedge-shaped piece of wood or a relatively flat piece of asbestos cement, molded to look like wood or an asphaltic material, used in overlapping courses to cover an outside wall surface. Wood shingles were at first split and shaved, and later sawn. Sawn shingles could have their exposed surface, the butt, shaped to create unusually patterns. In this way shingles added visual texture to building design.
• tin cladding: The cladding of exterior walls with tin.

skin / wall / clapboard

• clapboard: A long, narrow board with one edge thicker than the other, overlapped to cover the outer walls of frame structures; also known as weatherboard.
• clap-board: Riven (rather than sawn) horizontal feather-edged timber boards used for external cladding, also called bevel-siding, lap-siding, or weather-boarding, although the latter is properly sawn parallel-sided boards.
• clapboarding: The overlapping wedge-shaped boards forming the external covering of a timber-framed structure.
• clapboards: A type of cladding characterized by beveled overlapping boards with rabbeted upper edges; a popular type of wood siding in early-American domestic architecture.
• weatherboarding: A type of cladding characterized by beveled overlapping boards with rabbeted upper edges; a popular type of wood siding in early-American domestic architecture.

skin / wall / coping

• capping: Any architectural member serving as a cap, such as a coping.
• coping: A flat cover of stone or brick that protects the top of a wall.
• coping stone: A stone which forms a coping.
• crest table: A medieval term for a coping course.
• factabling: Same as coping.
• featheredge coping: Also see splayed coping, wedge coping.
• foot table: A coping upon the gable wall of a building when carried above the roof to form a parapet; especially, when broken into curves, steps, or the like…
• raking coping: A coping set on an inclined surface, as at a gable end.
• saddle coping: The protective uppermost course of a wall or parapet; projects beyond the wall surface to throw off rain.
• saddleback: A coping stone having its top surface sloped with its high point along the center ridge so that rainwater spills on either side; also called saddle-backed coping.
• saddle-back coping: See saddleback.
• saddlebacked coping: The protective uppermost course of a wall or parapet; projects beyond the wall surface to throw off rain.
• splayed coping: A coping that slopes only in one direction. Also called wedge coping.
• ushnisha: In Indian architecture, a coping.
• verge course: Overhanging brick coping on a gable wall.
• wedge coping: A coping that slopes only in one direction.

skin / wall / corbel

• arcaded corbel table: A row of corbels linked by arches.
• arched corbel table: In Early Christian and Romanesque architecture and derivatives, a raised band (often at the top of a wall) composed of small arches resting on corbels, the arcading regularly punctuated by junctures with pilaster strips.
• bragger: Also see corbel.
• chequer-set: Row of corbels or machicolations placed so that each alternate projection is higher or lower than its neighbor, i.e. set chequerwise.
• corbel: A block of stone projecting from a wall to support a beam or other weight.
• corbel course: A masonry course acting as a corbel, or an ornament of similar appearance. Also see stringcourse.
• corbel gable: A projecting stringcourse or masonry strip supported by corbels. Also see arched corbel table.
• corbel piece: Also see bolster.
• corbel step: Erroneous for corbiestep.
• corbel stop: A corbel where a surround stops, such as on a hood molding with a corbel stop.
• corbel table: A course projecting from a wall that is supported by a series of corbels. Corbel tables usually take on a simple stepped block form, but they may also be treated more decoratively, such as seen with the arcaded corbel table.
• corbel work: In Moorish and other Mohammedan styles, same as stalactite work.
• corbeled: An overlapping arrangement of bricks or stones in which each course steps upward and outward from the vertical face of a wall.
• corbeling: An overlapping arrangement of bricks or stones in which each course steps upward and outward from the vertical face of a wall.
• corbelling: A series of projections, each stepped out further than the one below it; most often found on walls and chimney stacks.
• corbels: A block of stone projecting from a wall to support a beam or other weight.
• corbel-step: Erroneous for corbiestep.
• pendentive bracketing: Corbeling in the general form of a pendentive; common in Moorish and Muslim architecture.
• pendentive corbelling: Corbeling in the general form of a pendentive; common in Moorish and Muslim architecture.
• skew corbel: A stone built into the bottom of a gable to form an abutment for the coping, eave gutters, or wall cornices.
• skew putt: Also see skew corbel.
• souse: Same as corbel. Also see souste.
• souste: Same as corbel. Also see souse.
• staggered corbelling: Row of corbels or machicolations placed so that each alternate projection is higher or lower than its neighbor, i.e. set chequerwise.
• stalactite work: A system of corbelling of peculiar form or the imitation of such corbelling in wood and plaster. So called from a fancied resemblance to natural stalactites.
• tailing: That portion of a projecting stone or series of stones, as in a cornice, which is built into the wall, and which, by its superior weight, is intended to prevent the stone from toppling over.
• zapata: In Spanish Colonial architecture, a corbeled wooden capital over a wooden column, often decoratively card or sawn.

skin / wall / corner

• cantilevered corners: A corner of a building supported by beams, which is supported at one end only, the other end hovering in the air.
• canton: A corner of a building decorated with a projecting masonry course, a pilaster, or similar feature.
• chaînes: A term applied to quines when the stones are square.
• coin: The corner of a building. 2. The stones or bricks which form the corner. 3. A wedge.
• coins: The corner of a building. 2. The stones or bricks which form the corner. 3. A wedge.
• coin-stones: Large stones, or rectangular pieces of wood or brick, used to decorate and accentuate the corners of a building; laid in vertical series with, usually, alternately large and small blocks. Besides their decorative purpose, some quoins actually serve the more functional purpose of reinforcing the corners of a building.
• corner: An interior or exterior meeting of two walls, facades, or surfaces, be they square, curved or stepped. Corners can be very ornate.
• corner block paterae: A small round or oval disk or medallion, may be quite simple.
• corner board: Boards placed at the corners of exterior walls to provide a neater appearance and to protect the ends of the wood siding.
• corner boards: Boards placed at the corners of exterior walls to provide a neater appearance and to protect the ends of the wood siding.
• corner brace: A diagonal brace let into studding to reinforce the corner of a frame structure.
• corner post: An assembly of two or three studs spiked together at the intersection of two framed walls to provide a nailing surface for finish materials.
• corners: An interior or exterior meeting of two walls, facades, or surfaces, be they square, curved or stepped. Corners can be very ornate.
• cutaway corner: A corner formed by the meeting of three wall surfaces; often embellished with corner brackets.
• extruded corner: Projection from the inner corner of a court or at the junction of a main block and a projecting wing, often containing a stair, carried above the roof-line…
• internal angle: Figure formed when two walls meet each other at an angle, as in the corner of a room, called a re-entrant.
• pillar-stone: Same as cornerstone. 2. A stone memorial, usually pillar-shaped.
• re-entrant: Two faces of a building meeting at an external angle form a salient, while two walls meeting at an internal angle form a re-entrant. An external angle or salient with an internal angle formed in it, as though, on plan, a small square had been removed from the angle of the building, is a re-entrant.
• rounded corners: In a building where the corner is rounded, typical of Art Moderne buildings.
• salient corner: A corner which projects outward; the opposite of a reentrant corner.

skin / wall / cornice

• arcaded cornice: A row of molded arches placed at the top of a wall and below the roof line.
• architrave cornice: An entablature from which the frieze is elided.
• block cornice: A cornice used in Italian architecture; usually consists of a bed molding, a range of block modillions or corbels, and a corona or cornice; the bed molding may be omitted. The block cornice differs from an architrave cornice in that the latter shows fascias only below the bed molding.
• box cornice: A hollow cornice, built up of boards, moldings, shingles, etc.
• boxed cornice: A hollow cornice, built up of boards, moldings, shingles, etc.
• bracketed cornice: These are brackets that hold the cornice in place. Modillions hold up the corona, and are sometimes used on cornices as well. The brackets are often paired.
• cavetto cornice: The characteristic cornice of most Egyptian buildings, consisting of a large cavetto decorated with vertical leaves, and a roll molding below.
• ceiling cornice: Same as cove molding.
• cheneau: Eaves-gutter with the profile of an elaborate cornice. 2. Ornamented crest, as on the ridge of a roof, or associated with a gutter at the eaves.
• chiyjah: In Indian architecture, or the Hindoo style, a cornice with a considerable projection.
• chujjah: In Indian architecture, or the Hindoo style, a cornice with a considerable projection.
• closed cornice: A box cornice. 2. A wood cornice which projects only slightly and has no soffit, having only a frieze board and crown molding.
• cornice board: A board along the roof line.
• cornice hook: A hook for hanging pictures from the cornice or picture molding of a room; a picture hook. It is usually of brass, and of a double curvature, the upper curve fitting over the top of the molding on which it is to be hung.
• cornice return: This deviation from the normal pediment design started in the Baroque age. In Neo-Classical Ontario architecture, cornice returns are frequently employed as a decorative element on the end of a gable or pediment, and also above doorways.
• cornice trim: Scroll wood-sawn wood along the roof line.
• cornicione: In Italian buildings of the Renaissance, and later styles, a wall cornice, so proportioned as to accommodate itself to the whole height of the wall and the whole mass of the building. The supposition is that each story has its own cornice, or at least that a number of string courses, each treated like a classical entablature and each having its own classical entablature and each having its own cornice, will have been built into the wall below; while the final or uppermost projecting member is proportioned, not to one story, but as to an imaginary order (of columns or pilasters) which would have had the whole height of the wall.
• coronarium: In ancient Rome, stucco work applied to the decoration of a cornice or projecting molding.
• eaves cornice: A decorative wooden cornice popular in the late 17th and early 18th century.
• Egyptian cornice: The characteristic cornice of most Egyptian buildings, consisting of a large cavetto molding decorated with vertical leaves, and a torus molding below.
• Egyptian gorge: A characteristic cornice of Egyptian buildings, consisting of a large cavetto decorated with vertical leaves and a roll molding below.
• epikranitis: A mold marking the top of a wall or forming the top member of a cornice. 2. An interior cornice.
• gorge and roll cornice: A projection along the top of a wall consisting of a concave upper part and a thick molding or rounded section below, much employed in Egyptian architecture.
• gorge cornice: Also see Egyptian gorge.
• Gothic cornice: An 18th century Gothick cornice or frieze consisting of a series of interlacing pointed arches not carried on anything, but with pendants hanging from where the arches would normally spring. A curious 20th c. use of the motif was under the cornice of Ideal House, Great Marlborough Street, London, by Raymond Hood.
• horizontal cornice: The level cornice of the pediment under the two inclined cornices.
• intermediate cornice: A horizontal ornamental molding above a prominent architectural element that is a part of a larger composition with its own more elaborate cornice.
• molded terra cotta cornice: Projecting ornamental molding along the top of a building or wall formed from terra cotta.
• open cornice: A cornice in which overhanging eaves are not boxed in and the rafters and the undersides of the roof sheathing are exposed but trimmed with a fascia board.
• plaster cornice: A plaster molding where the wall and ceiling meet, crowning the top of the wall.
• raking cornice: The sloping moldings of a pediment.
• simple cornice: A cornice consisting of only a frieze and molding.
• tin cornice: A manufactured stamped element in tin to give a dramatic finish to a commercial façade.
• underthroating: The cove of an outside cornice when treated so as to serve as a drip.

skin / wall / curtain wall

• column-cover-and-spandrel system: A curtain wall system in which vision-glass assemblies and spandrel units are supported by spandrel beams between exterior columns clad with cover sections.
• panel system: A curtain wall system consisting of preformed metal, cut stone, precast concrete, or panelized brick wall units, which may be preglazed or glazed after installation.
• stick system: A curtain wall system in which tubular metal mullions and rails are assembled piece by piece on-site to frame vision glass and spandrel units.
• unit system: Very large prefabricated glazing-units which, when fixed to a building’s structure, form a curtain wall.
• unit-and-mullion system: A curtain wall system in which one- or two-story-high mullions are installed before preassembled wall units are lowered into place behind the mullions. The framed wall units may be preglazed or glazed after installation.

skin / wall / finish

• Anglypta: A compressed lightweight molded wallpaper, a less expensive version of Lincrusta.
• crusta: Any veneer used in ancient Roman construction. It was common practice to cover large wall surfaces with veneers of marble.
• Lincrusta: An embossed wallpaper intended to be painted and varnished; popular from the late 19th century.
• moire: A fabric or wallpaper, usually silk that has been treated so that it has a watered or wavelike look.
• placage: An ornamental thin masonry facing (revetment) of a building.
• revetment: From Old French revestir, “to reclothe.” A wall facing or veneer consisting of panels of stone, marble, metal, or other material.
• wall ornamentation: Ornament on walls. May include of etched glass or bands of colored glass; contrasting color; name and date plates; etc.
• wall painting: The painting of the surface of a wall with ornamental designs or figure subjects, as decoration. It is usually classified as encaustic, fresco, or tempera painting.
• wall paper: Paper, usually decorated in colors, used for pasting on walls or ceilings of rooms…
• wall patterns: Painting or applied decoration on a wall in a geometric pattern, either done by free-hand or with stencils.
• wall sheathing: A rough covering of boards, plywood, or other panel materials applied to a frame structure to serve as a base for siding, flooring, or roofing.
• wallpaper: A paper or cloth with a decorative design printed on it and used to cover a wall.

skin / wall / frame

• cripple: A short structural member. Cripple studs are often found above or below wall openings; cripple rafters (or jack rafters) are found extending from hip rafters and valley rafters.
• cruck: One of a pair of large curved structural timbers, forming the end-walls of some timber-framed houses.
• orthostata: One of several vertical stone posts set in the base of a wall to form part of the facing, sometimes carved, e.g. forming part of the revetment at the base of a temple, cella, or as a form of dado.
• ribband: A 1″ x 4″ board in balloon framing which was set on edge and let into the two-story studs on the second floor.
• ribbon strip: A 1″ x 4″ board in balloon framing which was set on edge and let into the two-story studs on the second floor.
• shoe: A scantling laid upon a floor to form a base member for partition studding. 2. The base of a downspout, curved outward to direct the flow away from the wall. 3. The hard, pointed or rounded foot of a pile or caisson for piercing underlying soil. Also called drive shoe.
• sole: Same as solepiece. 2. Also see soleplate.
• solepiece: A horizontal member used to distribute the thrust of one or more uprights, posts, or struts. 2. A member on which the foot of a raking shore rests.
• soleplate: Same as solepiece. 2. A horizontal timber which serves as a base for the studs in a stud partition.
• stud: Any of a series of slender, upright members of wood or metal forming the structural frame of a wall or partition.
• tailpiece: A relatively short beam, joist, or rafter supported by a wall at one end and by a header at the other. Also called stringer. 2. A lookout.

skin / wall / jetty

• jettie: The overhanging cantilever or projection of an upper story in front of the facade of the story below it.
• jettied: A term describing a timber-framed building whose upper story overhangs the lower story.
• jettied story: An upper story of a building that projects out over the story beneath it, common in Colonial American architecture.
• jetty: The overhanging cantilever or projection of an upper story in front of the facade of the story below it.
• jettying: A building technique used in medieval timber frame buildings in which an upper floor projects beyond the dimensions of the floor below.
• jutty: Also see jetty.
• overshot: Same as jetty.

skin / wall / lintel

• continuous lintels and sills: A lintel and sill that connects each window on an elevation and ties the windows into an overall pattern.
• fang: A wall plant, rectangular in cross section, which lies along the top of a main lintel on peripteral columns in traditional Chinese architecture. 2. A member which interconnects and ties together clusters of tou kung. 3. In traditional Chinese architecture, a permanent structure, usually of wood but sometimes of stone, built in the shape of a barge and located adjacent to a lake or pond as a feature of landscape architecture; used for dining, drinking, and relaxation.
• fireplace lintel: A beam over a fireplace supporting the weight of the chimney.
• hyperthyris: Lintel or supercilium of an architrave over a Classical doorway or other aperture. Hyperthyrum is the frieze between architrave and cornice in a similar position.
• lintel: A beam over an opening in a wall or over two or more pillars or posts.
• marriage stone: A stone lintel, usually carved, with a marriage date.
• overthrow: A panel of ornamental metalwork placed like a lintel above metal gates.
• segmental lintel: A lintel usually made of brick and located over window or door openings.
• shaped lintel: A lintel with a shaped form over a window or door opening.
• splayed lintel: A lintel that is spread or turned out, each end of which slants downward toward the center line of the window; often has a keystone in its center.

skin / wall / modillion

• angle modillion: A modillion at the corner of a cornice.
• block modillion: A modillion in the form of a plain block.
• intermodillion: The space between two modillions, as in an architrave.
• modillion course: A small curved ornamented bracket used in series.
• modillions: A small curved and ornamented bracket used to support the upper part of the cornice in the Corinthian order; any such small curved ornamented bracket used in series.
• modillons: Series of ornamental brackets.
• scroll-like modillions: A small curved and ornamented bracket used to support the upper part of the cornice in the Corinthian order; any such small curved ornamented bracket used in series.
• uncut modillion: See modillion.

skin / wall / niche

• alhacena: In Spanish architecture, a recess or niche…
• alhauna: A niche or other recess.
• almehrabh: In Arabian architecture, a niche in a mosque which marks the decoration of Mecca.
• almery: A recess or built-in receptacle for the sacred vessels of the Mass.
• angle niche: A niche formed in the corner of a building; common in medieval architecture.
• apse: A recess, usually singular and semi-circular, at the east end of a Christian church.
• arcosolium: An arched niche in the catacombs of Rome.
• aumbry: A recess to hold sacred vessels, often found in castle chapels.
• blank door: A recess in a wall, having the appearance of a door; usually used for symmetry of design. 2. A door which has been sealed off but is still visible.
• chinikhana: Hindustani term for a niche or other ornamental recess.
• devagosta: In the architecture of India, a niche.
• double-sunk: Recessed or lowered in two steps, as when a panel is sunk below the surface of a larger panel.
• gokhala: In Jain architecture (India), a niche.
• ground niche: A niche whose base is on a level with the floor.
• ingo: Reveal or return face of a wall in a recess, such as a niche, doorway or window.
• ingoing: Reveal or return face of a wall in a recess, such as a niche, doorway or window.
• k’an: In ancient Chinese architecture, a niche for the storage of manuscripts; later such niches were used as shrines for the tablets of ancestors or for statues; the more elaborate niches include pedestals and columns; the less elaborate niches (in small houses) were used to display works of art or to house incense burners.
• kiot: In early Russian architecture, a niche to house one or more icons.
• mihrab: A niche or other feature of a Mohammedan mosque, indicating the direction in which lies Mecca.
• niche: A recess in a wall to place various decorations.
• pechura: In early Russian architecture, a niche in a masonry wall.
• recess: A sinkage in a wall plane, usually right-angled as differentiated from a niche.
• shirinka: An ornamental insert in early Russian architecture; a framed rectangular or square recess in a masonry wall; may have an ornamental stone or brick at its center.
• sinkage: A recess or set-back panel of slight depth, usually occurring in wall, ceiling, or floor.
• thole: Also see tholos. 2. A niche or recess in which votive offerings were made. 3. A knot or escutcheon at the apex of a timber vault.

skin / wall / opening

• aperture: Opening in a wall for access, the admission of light or air (or both), or for defense or aesthetic reasons. Its sides are jambs, its top a head, lintel, or arch; and its bottom the cill.
• eyelet: A small opening for light and air, or for the discharge of missiles, in the wall or parapet of a mediaeval castle; usually widening toward the interior, or backed by an embrasure. The opening was usually round or square, or else extremely long and narrow; sometimes with a cross slit, or enlarged at the center or ends by a round aperture for the discharge of firearms.
• gun-loop: Aperture, often of horizontal elliptical form, in a wall to enable fire to be directed over a wide angle, found in Scots architecture, even in 19th c. revivals.
• loop: A narrow opening.
• oylet: Also see eyelet.
• squint: An oblique opening in the interior wall of a medieval church to afford a view of the high altar for persons in the transepts or aisles; a hagioscope.
• tuss: Projecting tenon or toothing-stone left in a wall to enable another wall to be joined and bonded to it.

skin / wall / panel

• bead and butt: Framed work in which the panel is flush with the framing and has a bead run on two edges in the direction of the grain; the ends are left plain.
• bead butt: A method, and the result, of framing panels flush with the rails and stiles on all sides, each panel having the two longer edges, with the grain, worked into beads which butt against the rail or stile at the ends.
• bead butt and square: Similar to bead and butt but having the panels flush on the beaded face only, and showing square reveals on the other.
• scapulary tablet: In Zapotec style architecture, a regional variation of the tablero. The Zapotecs modified the original tablero, heightening the chiaroscuro effect of the wall below.
• tablero: In the architecture of Mesoamerica, a rectangular framed panel which is cantilevered over an outward sloping apron (talud), with which it is always used; characteristic of the Teotihuacan style of architecture, constituting their most prominent architectural contribution; introduced ca. 150 A.D.; widely copied throughout Mesoamerica, with regional variations.
• talud-tablero: An architectural feature combining a tablero with a sloping talud, over which it is cantilevered. This combination is repeated over the façade of stepped temple pyramids; an original contribution of Teotihuacan architecture, widely copied throughout Mesoamerica.

skin / wall / parapet

• aloring: The parapet walls of a church.
• alorying: The parapet walls of a church.
• battlemented parapet: A parapet wall at the edge of a roof with alternating slots and raised portions.
• battlements: A parapet wall at the edge of a roof with alternating slots and raised portions.
• blocking: A number of small wood pieces inserted to space, join, or reinforce members of a building frame, fill the spaces between them, or provide a nailing surface for finish materials. 2. A little used term for a parapet.
• castellations: A parapet topped with alternating indentations and raised portions, originally for defense, but later used as a decorative motif
• crenelations: A parapet wall at the edge of a roof with alternating slots and raised portions.
• embrasures: A decorative element that simulates the spaces of a defensive parapet.
• false parapet: An ornamental element having the appearance of a low wall at the edge of a roof.
• Merlons: The tooth of a crenellated wall; a solid between two voids.
• parapet: A low guarding wall at any point of sudden drop, as at the edge of a terrace, roof, battlement, balcony, etc. 2. In an exterior wall, fire wall, or party wall, the part entirely above the roof.
• parapet trim: Trim along a low, solid, protective wall or railing along the edge of a roof or balcony.
• pluteus: In ancient Roman architecture, a dwarf wall or parapet; especially one closing the lower portion of the space between the columns of a colonnade.
• Polish parapet: Type of Renaissance parapet ornamented with blind arcades, aedicules, pilasters, pedestals, pediments, pyramids, etc., concealing the roof, commonly found in Poland…
• scupper: An opening in a parapet wall with a spout, allowing water to drain through from a roof or balcony.
• stepped parapet: A parapet that rises above the level of the roof line. In commercial buildings gives a more substantial appearance.

skin / wall / partition

• bearing partition: An interior wall carrying a structural load. Also called load-bearing partition.
• bearing partitions: Carry loads in addition to their own weight.
• demountable partition: A partition capable of being moved to different locations.
• hallan: Also see halland.
• halland: In the dialect of Scotland and the north of England, a partition, as in a cottage, often a solid one without openings of any sort as when used to separate the part of the cottage occupied by the family from that used as a cowhouse… Also see halland.
• interclose: Partition. 2. Passage between two rooms in a house.
• ledged partition: A partition constructed of vertical boards, which are secured at top and bottom by horizontal ledges.
• ledgment: Also see ledgement.
• load-bearing partition: An interior wall carrying a structural load.
• movable partition: A partition capable of being moved to different locations. Also called demountable partition.
• non load-bearing partitions: Partitions that act only as dividing walls and do not support vertical loads.
• nonbearing partition: Partitions that act only as dividing walls and do not support vertical loads.
• non-load-bearing partition: Partitions that act only as dividing walls and do not support vertical loads.
• partition: An interior wall that separates adjacent rooms within any story of a building.
• shoji: A very lightweight sliding partition used in Japanese architecture; consists of a wooden lattice covered on one side with translucent white rice paper. The lattice is most often composed of small horizontal rectangles, but narrow vertical rectangles or asymmetrical shapes also are used. The lower section is occasionally filled by a thin wooden panel.
• stud partition: A wall or partition framed with studs and faced with sheathing, siding, wallboard, or plasterwork.

skin / wall / pediment

• bonnet-top: Broken, scrolled pediment.
• broken apex pediment: A pediment where the two sloping sides do not meet at the apex (top) of the pediment.
• broken bed pediment: A pediment in which the base molding is discontinuous.
• broken pediments: A pediment with its cornices interrupted at the midpoint or peak, usually to frame a decorative detail such as a cartouche or urn. Commonly seen over Federal doorways and windows.
• broken scroll pediment: A pediment with a free-flowing profile with a cornice that is interrupted at the top.
• curved pediment: Pediment with an arc of less than 180 degrees.
• eagle: A pediment of a Greek building.
• fronton: A small pediment placed over a door, niche, porch, etc.
• interrupted pediment: Also see broken pediment.
• open bed pediment: Also see broken bed pediment.
• open pediment: Broken pediment.
• open topped pediment: Also see broken apex pediment.
• pediment: In classical architecture, the triangular gable end of the roof above the horizontal cornice, often filled with sculpture. 2. In later work, a surface used ornamentally over doors or windows; usually triangular but sometimes curved.
• pedimental: Relating to, or of the nature of, a pediment; found on a pediment; designed to be used on a pediment; thus the Niobe Group in the Uffizi Gallery is pedimental sculpture.
• pedimented: Provided with a pediment; constructed in the form of a pediment. A pedimented gable is a gable of which the foot of the coping or cornice is connected with the opposite foot by a horizontal string course, thus, in a measure, recalling the classic original.
• pedimented frontispiece: A portion of the façade of a building, usually a centered doorway that is slightly raised from the rest of the building and has a pediment.
• pedimented pavilion: A portion of a building projected forward and otherwise set apart, or even a separate structure, with a pediment overhead.
• pediments: A triangular section often used above doors and windows or as porch tops.
• round pediment: A rounded pediment used ornamentally over a door or window.
• scroll pediment : A pediment with a free-flowing profile that may be complete or broken.
• scrolled pediment: Also see swan’s neck pediment.
• segmental pediment: Pediment with an arc of less than 180 degrees.
• segmented pediment: A pediment in the form of a segmented arch.
• semicircular pediment: Pediment with a semicircular shape.
• swan’s-neck pediment: A type of broken pediment with S-shaped curves, like two swans’ necks facing each other.
• triangular pediment: A pediment of triangular profile.

skin / wall / pilaster

• banded pilaster: A pilaster decorated in the manner of a banded column.
• blocked pilaster: A pilaster treated with regularly projecting blocks, typically of varying textures, also called a rusticated pilaster.
• cantoned: Ornamented at the corners with projecting pilasters. 2. Descriptive of a building which is decorated at the corners with columns, pilasters, rusticated quoins, etc., projecting from the face of the building.
• coupled pilasters: Two closely spaced pilasters forming a pair.
• fluted pilasters: The representation in relief of a column against a wall with fluting so as to further resemble a column.
• interpilaster: The space between two pilasters. Also see interquarter.
• lisena: A Romanesque pilaster strip.
• parastatica: A pilaster attached to a Greek temple; a parastas.
• pilaster: The representation in relief of a column against a wall. The pilaster is sometimes considered as the visible part of a square column built into the wall. Pilasters are necessarily ornamental. They have a quasi-structural function, however, when acting as responds, i.e. as the thickening of a wall opposite a column whose entablature carries over to the wall.
• pilaster base: Also see base block.
• pilaster block: Any of various concrete masonry units used in constructing a plain or reinforced masonry pilaster.
• pilaster face: The form for the front surface of a pilaster, parallel to the wall.
• pilaster mass: An engaged pier built up with the wall, usually without the capital and base of a pilaster.
• pilaster side: The form for the side surface of a pilaster, perpendicular to the wall.
• pilaster strip: Same as pilaster mass but usually applied to slender piers of slight projection; in medieval architecture and derivatives, often joining an arched corbel table.
• pilastered arcades: The representation in relief of a column and arcade against a wall.
• pilastered parapet: A low, solid, protective wall or railing along the edge of a roof or balcony often used to obscure a low-pitched roof.
• pilaster-like mullions: The vertical member in the form of a pilaster separating windows, doors, or other panels set in a series. Common in tall buildings.
• pilasters: A decorative, rectangular column attached to a wall, often so as to resemble a classical column.
• pilastrade: A line of pilasters.
• pilastrata: In Italian, and by adoption in English, a row, series, or order of pilasters.
• rusticated pilaster: Also see pilaster.
• trunk: That part of a pilaster corresponding to the shaft of a column. 2. The main stem of a tree apart from its branches and roots. 3. A duct for conveying warm air from a furnace to a stack or branch duct.

skin / wall / plate

• pan: A wall plate. 2. A part, larger or smaller, of an exterior wall; in half-timbered work in England, especially one of those spaces which are left between the upright and horizontal timbers, and which are filled either with plastering or laths, or by rough brickwork, or the like… 3. A reusable metal or fiberglass mold used in forming a ribbed slab, available in standard 20- and 30-inch (508- and 762-mm) widths and a variety of depths. 4. A major vertical division of a wall, especially a nogged panel of half-timber construction.
• raising plate: A horizontal timber resting on a wall, or upon vertical timbers of a frame, and supporting the heels of rafters or other framework; also called a wall plate.
• roof plate: A wall plate which receives the lower ends of the rafters of a roof.
• sole plate: Bottom horizontal of a frame wall.
• tie plate: A metal clamp that helps prevent walls from bulging; often ornamental in appearance.
• top plate: A horizontal member placed on the top of a framed wall to carry the roof rafters of the frame.
• wall plate: A horizontal member built into or laid along the top of a wall to support and distribute the load from joists or rafters.

skin / wall / property

• attached: Attached to the wall.
• back fillet: The return of the margin of a groin, doorjamb, or window jamb when it projects beyond a wall.
• backing: Stone, brick, etc. forming the unexposed or unfinished wall behind the face stones; generally, backing is of an inferior or cheaper class of material. Backing also is used to describe the backfill of a retaining wall. 2. A bevel given to the outer and upper edge of a hip rafter in order to allow sheathing to fit the top of the rafter without leaving a triangular space between it and the lower side of the roof covering. 3. A narrow wood strip fixed to the corner of a framed partition to provide a nailing surface for finish materials.
• edge bedded: A position of stones in masonry walling.
• elbow board: Also see stool.
• elbows: Portion of wall that extends beyond the roofline.
• face bedded: A position of stones in masonry walling.
• field: The upper part of a wall, between the frieze or cornice and the dado.
• grab bar: A bar attached to a wall near a bathtub or shower to provide a hand grip for a person who is bathing.
• intramural: Within the walls.
• leaning place: Also see allege.
• offset: A shift in the plane of a wall, resulting in a ledge or a shallow, right-angled break.
• openwork: Ornament that projects from the surface of the wall, aligned in the same plane as the edge of the roof.
• orthostates: In a Greek temple, the lower deep course in the naos walls.
• pane-work: Division of an external wall into panes or panels, as in a timber-framed structure.
• parastas: The end of a wall, terminating in an anta, such as that enclosing the pronaos of a temple. 2. A pedestal-like wall, as the abutment of the end of a monumental stairway. 3. A flat column or pilaster, used to decorate the angular terminations of a square building.
• parastata: The end of a wall, terminating in an anta, such as that enclosing the pronaos of a temple. 2. A pedestal-like wall, as the abutment of the end of a monumental stairway. 3. A flat column or pilaster, used to decorate the angular terminations of a square building.
• pendill: From French word meaning “hanging.” Also the projecting and exposed lower end of a post of the overhanging upper story; common in 17th century New England houses.
• piedroit: A pier or small pillar, partly hidden within a wall; it differs from a pilaster in having neither base nor cap.
• sail over: Any projection or jutting beyond the general wall surface. Also, sale over, oversale, oversail. A term connected with salient.
• sail-over: Any projection or jutting beyond the general wall surface.
• salt in brick walls: See efflorescence.
• shear wall: A vertical diaphragm acting as a thin, deep cantilever beam in transferring lateral loads to the ground foundation.
• staggered wood: A pattern in wooden walling.
• tile creasing: A weather-protective barrier at the top of a brick wall; consists of two courses of tiles which project beyond both faces of the wall, so as to throw off rainwater. Also see creasing.
• wall base: A low thickened section of a wall. Also see socle.
• wall piece: A board which is placed vertically against a wall and to which the shorting for the wall is fitted; also called a wall piece.
• wall space: Plain wall surface between windows, doors, and like interruptions.

skin / wall / quoin

• angle stone: Also see quoin.
• coign: Also see quoin.
• coigne: Also see quoin.
• coillon: Also see quoin.
• coyn: Also see coyning.
• coyning: Also see coyning.
• cune: An obsolete term for quoin.
• long-and-short work: In rubble masonry, quoins which are placed alternately horizontally and vertically.
• quine: Also see quoin.
• quoin: The dressed or finished stones at the corners of a masonry building. Sometimes faked in wooden or stucco buildings.
• quoin header: A quoin which is a header in the face of a wall and a stretcher in the face of the return wall.
• quoin stone: A quoin.
• quoining: Any architectural members which form a quoin.
• quoins: The dressed or finished stones at the corners of a masonry building. Sometimes faked in wooden or stucco buildings.
• rustic quoin: A quoin treated with sunken joints, the face of the quoins being generally roughened and raised above the general surface of the masonry.
• squint quoin: Also see squint quoin.
• vermiculated quoins: Quoins decorated with wormlike tracery or markings.

skin / wall / retaining

• backing up: The process of building some piece of masonry which will retain earth or sand. A piece of masonry so built’ a retaining wall, especially a rough and unarchitectural one.
• breast timber: A horizontal timber or steel beam for reinforcing various vertical members, as in formwork or sheet piling, or for retaining earth at the edge of an embankment.
• gabion: A galvanized wire basket filled with stones and used in constructing an abutment or retaining structure.
• ranger: A horizontal timber or steel beam for reinforcing various vertical members, as in formwork or sheet piling, or for retaining earth at the edge of an embankment.
• wale: A horizontal timber or steel beam for reinforcing various vertical members, as in formwork or sheet piling, or for retaining earth at the edge of an embankment. Also called breast timber, ranger, waler.
• waler: A horizontal stiffener for concrete forms, sheet piling, and the like. 2. A horizontal timber or steel beam for reinforcing various vertical members, as in formwork or sheet piling, or for retaining earth at the edge of an embankment.

skin / wall / siding

• aluminum siding: Lightweight material that is often painted rather than left in its natural color.
• asbestos-cement siding: A stiff cladding made of asbestos fiber and portland cement; most commonly seen as long shingles, often with a simulated wood grain surface; may be painted.
• asphalt roll brick siding: Made from saturated felts coated with asphalt and having mineral (“metal”) granules on the side exposed to the weather; manufactured in shingle form, in rolls, or in panels with an insulated backing. Roll materials often have differently colored and embossed mineral surfaces that simulate brick and stone. A frequently seen example of this type of siding is asphalt roll brick siding. It was a popular method of covering inferior or badly weathered wood cladding in the middle part of the 20th century.
• asphalt siding: Made from saturated felts coated with asphalt and having mineral (“metal”) granules on the side exposed to the weather; manufactured in shingle form, in rolls, or in panels with an insulated backing. Roll materials often have differently colored and embossed mineral surfaces that simulate brick and stone…
• beaded edge siding: A horizontal siding in which the lower edges of the boards are ornamented with a horizontal bead molding.
• beaded horizontal board siding: A form of beveled siding, like clapboard, that features a bead on the lower edge. The bead is a molding with a convex circular section and a continuous cylindrical surface. Beaded siding is nailed the same way that clapboard is.
• beaded siding: A form of beveled siding, like clapboard, that features a bead on the lower edge. The bead is a molding with a convex circular section and a continuous cylindrical surface. Beaded siding is nailed the same way that clapboard is.
• bevel siding: Horizontal overlapping boards that are thinner at the top than they are at the bottom.
• beveled siding: Horizontal overlapping boards that are thinner at the top than they are at the bottom.
• bevelled board: A type of wood siding.
• board and batten: A siding consisting of long vertical boards and thin strips, or battens; the battens are used to conceal the gaps between the siding boards.
• board and batten finish: A siding consisting of long vertical boards and thin strips, or battens; the battens are used to conceal the gaps between the siding boards.
• board and batten siding: A siding consisting of long vertical boards and thin strips, or battens; the battens are used to conceal the gaps between the siding boards.
• butt edge siding: An exterior horizontal wood siding in which boards of consistent depth are applied so that each board abuts the adjacent board without overlap; also called flush siding.
• clapboard siding: Tapered wood boards lapped one over another to form horizontal siding.
• colonial siding: Wide, square-edged siding boards used extensively in early American construction.
• Dolly Varden siding: Bevel siding rabbeted along the lower edge to receive the upper edge of the board below it.
• drop siding: A type of cladding characterized by overlapping boards with either tongued and grooved or rabbeted top and bottom edges. Oftentimes, the upper part of each board has a concave curve, in which case the siding is sometimes referred to as German siding.
• fabric: Siding, or the material that covers the outside of the walls of a house. It may be clapboards, shingles, veneer brickwork, metal or vinyl siding among other materials.
• flush siding: Also see butt edge siding.
• German siding: A type of cladding characterized by overlapping boards with either tongued and grooved or rabbeted top and bottom edges. Oftentimes, the upper part of each board has a concave curve, in which case the siding is sometimes referred to as German siding.
• horizontal siding: A type of siding.
• lap siding: Also see clapboard.
• novelty siding: The horizontal board siding in which the upper and lower boards are connected by means of various simple joints, such as a rabbet or shiplap.
• parallel faced siding: An exterior, horizontal wood siding in which boards of consistent depth are applied with the lower edge overlapping the board below.
• rustic siding: Siding composed of boards narrowed along the upper edges to fit into rabbets or grooves in the lower edges, laid horizontally with their backs flat against the sheathing or studs of the wall.
• shingle siding: As cladding, a shingle is a wedge-shaped piece of wood or a relatively flat piece of asbestos cement, molded to look like wood or an asphaltic material, used in overlapping courses to cover an outside wall surface. Wood shingles were at first split and shaved, and later sawn. Sawn shingles could have their exposed surface, the butt, shaped to create unusually patterns. In this way shingles added visual texture to building design.
• shiplap siding: A flush, overlapping joint, as a rabbet, between two boards joined edge to edge. Also, the boarding joined with such overlapping joints.
• shiplap wood siding: A type of wood siding.
• siding: A weatherproof material, as shingles, boards, or units of sheet metal, used for surfacing the exterior walls of a frame building.
• siding siedlung: Also see siedlungen.
• simple drop wood siding: A type of wooden siding.
• steel siding: Heavy siding material which remains very durable and weather resistant.
• vertical siding: Siding consisting of matched boards applied vertically.
• weatherboard: An English term for clapboard or beveled siding.
• weatherboards: An English term for clapboard or beveled siding.
• wood siding: Methods of placing wood on the side of buildings for cladding and decorative effect.
• wooden clapboards: Long slats of wood that are nailed to an exterior surface in a horizontal fashion, overlapping one another from top to bottom. Clapboards are a traditional weather-proofing device.

skin / wall / spandrel

• allege: A thinning of part of a wall, as in a spandrel under a windowsill.
• spandrel: A section of wall, often defined as an ornamental panel, between two vertically aligned windows or arches.
• spandrel beam: A beam designed to support the window or windows and wall of a story height between neighboring upright columns.
• spandrel panel: The panel formed by the bottom of a window and the head of a lower window.
• spandrel wall: A wall or partition erected on the extrados of an arch filling in the spandrels.
• splandrel: Also see spandrel.

skin / wall / tie

• balk-tie: A balk, which joins the wall posts of a timber roof, preventing the walls from spreading.
• baulk-tie: A balk, which joins the wall posts of a timber roof, preventing the walls from spreading.
• butterfly wall tie: A type of metal tie.
• tieback: A steel rod or tendon attached to a deadman or a rock or soil anchor to prevent lateral movement of a retaining wall or framework.
• wall ties: Metal strips of wire used to connect the two leaves of a cavity wall, or to firmly link facing to a backing.

skin / wall / veneer

• adhered veneer: A veneer supported by and secured to a backing by means of a bonding material.
• anchored veneer: A veneer supported by and secured to a backing by means of mechanical fasteners.
• ashlar veneer: Also see masonry veneer.
• brick veneer: A single layer of brick applied to the face of a wood framed wall.
• cobblestone veneer: An outer covering laid against, but not structurally bonded to, a wall; used to cover inferior structural material thereby giving an improved appearance at a lower cost.
• masonry veneer: An outer covering laid against, but not structurally bonded to, a wall; used to cover inferior structural material thereby giving an improved appearance at a lower cost. Also, masonry veneer may be used as an alternative exterior siding for wood framed houses.
• rock rash: A patchwork applique of oddly shaped stone slabs; used on edge as a veneer; often further embellished with cobbles or geodes.
  stone veneer: An outer covering of stone laid against, but not structurally bonded to, a wall; used to cover inferior structural material thereby giving an improved appearance at a lower cost.
• veneer: A decorative layer of brick, wood, or other material used to cover inferior structural material thereby giving an improved appearance at a low cost. 2. A thin sheet of wood rotary cut, sliced, or sawn from a log or flitch and used as a superior facing to inferior wood or bonded together to form plywood.

skin / wall / wainscot

• dado: Lower part of an interior wall when paneled or painted separately from the main part. 2. A rectangular groove cut in a member to receive the end of another.
• dwarf wainscoting: In Great Britain, wainscoting covering only the lower part of the walls of a room, usually 2 feet 6 inches to 5 or 6 feet high. In the U.S., a dado of woodwork; rare, as wainscoting is there seldom used for the whole wall.
• lambruscatura: The medieval equivalent of wainscot.
• wainscot: A wood lining of interior walls, usually less than the height of the room.
• wainscoting: The wood covering of the lower part of an interior wall.
• wainscotting: The wood covering of the lower part of an interior wall.

skin / wall / wall

• aileron: A wing wall to mask the aisle of a church.
• album: In ancient Roman architecture, a space on the surface of a wall covered with white plaster, located in a public place, on which public announcements and records, etc., were written.
• area wall: The wall surrounding, or partly surrounding, an area; specifically, the retaining wall of an area.
• ashlar wall: A dressed or squared stone and the masonry built of such hewn stone. It may be coursed, with continuous horizontal joints, or random, with discontinuous joints.
• backup wall: An assembly of materials used behind a curtain wall to provide the required degree of fire-resistance.
• basement wall: A foundation wall that encloses a usable area under a building.
• battened wall: Also see strapped wall.
• battered wall: A wall that is thicker at the bottom than at the top. Battered walls are a common feature in Pueblo Revival architecture.
• bearing wall: A wall that supports any vertical load (such as the floor, roof, or ceiling above) in addition to its own weight. A wall that does not support a vertical load is called a nonbearing wall, nonbearing partition, or simply partition.
• bin wall: A type of gravity retaining wall formed by stacking modular, interlocking precast concrete units and filling the voids with crushed stone or gravel. Also called cellular wall.
• black-and-white: Exposed timber framing with white infill, as seen on Elizabethan and Tudor houses.
• blank wall: Also see blind wall, dead wall.
• blind wall: A wall having no windows, doorways, or other openings.
• board-and-batten: From French, baton; and from Latin, bastum, “stick.” A narrow strip of wood used to cover and seal a joint or crack
• breast wall: A retaining wall. 2. A parapet which is breast high.
• cant wall: A wall canted on a plan.
• canted wall: A wall built to incline at an angle, especially an obtuse angle. An entire corner of a building may be canted.
• cantilever wall: A retaining wall of reinforced concrete or reinforced concrete masonry, cantilevered from and securely tied to a spread footing that is shaped to resist overturning and sliding.
• canvas wall: A plastered wall to which a layer of canvas has been applied to serve as a base for wallpaper.
• casemate wall: A city or fortress enclosure consisting of an outer and an inner masonry wall braced by transverse masonry partitions, which divide the interstitial space into a series of chambers for fill or storage.
• cashel: In Irish archaeology, an enclosing wall of rough stone, intended either for defense as forming part of a rude fort, or enclosing a church or several sacred buildings. By some writers the term has been adopted for general use as meaning an enclosure of rough stonework.
• cavity wall: An exterior wall consisting of two leaves linked by galvanized metal or iron wall ties; the cavity between the two leaves may or may not contain thermal insulating or moisture-proofing material.
• cellular wall: A type of gravity retaining wall formed by stacking modular, interlocking precast concrete units and filling the voids with crushed stone or gravel.
• chao ch’iang: See ying pi.
• chao pi: See ying pi.
• cheek wall: A low, upright face of a wall, especially one framing an opening and projecting beyond the envelope of a building.
• choir wall: A wall between piers and under an arcade screening the choir from the aisles.
• clay walling: A primitive method of wall construction in regions abounding in clay, as in Mesopotamia, in some parts of Great Britain, and of Southwestern states of the U.S. The wall is sometimes formed of compacted or stamped clay in the mass (pise), sometimes and more often of unburned bricks dried in the sun, called in the United States and Spanish America adobe. In some cases the clay wall is baked at least in part by fires of fagots built against it.
• coatepantli: A carved wall featuring the serpent motif; introduced in Toltec architecture ca. 1000 A.D. at Tula (home of Quetzalcoatl, deified as the Feathered Serpent) and used extensively by the Aztecs thereafter.
• cob wall: A wall formed of unburnt clay mixed with chopped straw, gravel, and occasionally with layers of long straw, in which the straw acts as a bond.
• composite wall: A masonry wall having at least one wythe dissimilar to the other wythe or wythes with respect to type or grade of masonry unit or mortar.
• concrete wall: A wall made by performing concrete in to forms where it hardens.
• conservative wall: Garden-wall against which glass structures are built to enable plants to be grown.
• corner wall: The treatment at the corners where two wall surfaces join.
• counter wall: An independent side wall erected against that of an adjacent existing building, when the latter stands entirely upon its own side of the party line. Counter walls are necessary when there is no party wall (i.e., a wall centered upon the party line), except when the right is acquired by purchase or otherwise of using the existing adjacent side wall for the new building, and the wall is heavy enough for the purpose.
• counterscarp wall: The revetment of the counterscarp, usually made of stone or brick, but sometimes of timber.
• crinkle-crankle: A serpentine wall, especially in 18th century Suffolk.
• crinkum-crankum: Garden wall, usually aligned east-west so that one side faces south, on a plan of elongated S-shaped curves joined in a continuous ribbon or serpentine form that stiffens the wall, enabling it to be less thick than a straight wall would have to be for stability, and removing the need for buttresses.
• curtain wall: A nonloadbearing wall of any material, entirely hung from and outside the structural frame of a building.
• curtain-wall: A nonloadbearing wall of any material, entirely hung from and outside the structural frame of a building.
• curved wall: A wall commonly with a bowed or bent window.
• dead wall: A blank wall.
• diamicton: In ancient Roman architecture, a type of masonry wall construction having a hollow cavity filled with broken material of every description.
• dike: A dry stone wall.
• division wall: A fire-resistant wall between houses.
• drumwall: A stack of black, water-filled drums placed on the inside of a window wall to absorb soil heat and then release it slowly into the interior of a building.
• dry stone wall: A wall composed of stones not cemented with mortar.
• dry wall: In masonry construction, a self-supporting rubble or ashlar wall built without mortar.
• dwarf wall: A wall of less height than a full story, or which does not rise to the full height required for screening or protection, and, therefore, is often topped with a fence or railing. The Bahut, or low wall, which carries the external roof of a Gothic building and the eaves proper, is a dwarf wall.
• dyke: Dry-stone rubble wall.
• earth rammed: Soil and cement are compacted together and compacted with forms. Later the forms are removed and a solid earth wall remains.
• earth tieback wall: A retaining wall consisting of precast concrete panels fastened to long galvanized steel straps extending into a compacted soil backfill.
• eaves wall: The wall below the eaves of a roof.
• economy wall: A brick wall 4 inches (102 mm) thick, plastered and strengthened at intervals with 8 inch 9203 mm) pilasters to support roof trusses.
• emplection: Greek and Roman masonry in which thick walls were faced on both sides with ashlar and filled with rubble.
• endwall: A concrete or masonry retaining wall at the outlet of a drain or culvert.
• enplecton: Greek or Roman masonry consisting of cut stone facings with an infilling of rubble.
• exterior wall: A wall forming part of the envelope of a building, having one face exposed to the weather or to earth. Also called external wall.
• external wall: A wall forming part of the envelope of a building, having one face exposed to the weather or to earth.
• face wall: The front wall of a building. 2. A retaining wall.
• faced wall: A wall having a masonry facing bonded to a backing so as to exert a common action under load.
• fire wall: A wall having the required fire-resistance rating to prevent the spread of fire from one part of a building to another, extending from the foundation to a parapet above the roof and having all openings restricts to a certain percentage of the wall length and protected by a self-closing or automatic-closing fire assembly. Each portion of a building separated by one or more fire walls may be considered a separate building when calculating the floor area and height allowed by a building code.
• flared wall: Walls that break the plane of the original framing on elevations and porches, with the lower portion of each wall flaring beyond the foundation.
• flint wall: One built in the English custom, its outer shell of flints with their rough faces.
• flue-wall: Garden or conservatory-wall containing flues for hot air from a boiler-house, e.g. Dearn’s or rat-trap bond.
• flush wall: A wall with no projections.
• fruit-wall: As crinkle-crankle or serpentine wall.
• fusuma: A sliding interior partition used in Japanese domestic or temple architecture; its exterior frame is plain or lacquered wood; its core is composed of a wood lattice framework which is covered with heavy paper or cloth; the surface may be decorated with an all-over pattern or with ink paintings.
• gable wall: A wall which is crowned by a gable.
• glass curtain wall: A nonloadbearing wall of glass, entirely hung from and outside the structural frame of a building.
• gravity wall: A masonry or concrete retaining wall that resists overturning and sliding by the sheer weight and volume of its mass.
• half timbered: Composed of timber so far as the framing is concerned, the spaces of which framing are then filled in with masonry in some form…
• half timbering: A construction method in which vertical and horizontal timbers make up the frame of the wall, which is then filled in with lath and plaster (nogging), sticks and mud or clay (wattle and daub), stone, or brick.
• half-timber: A technique of wooden-frame construction in which the members are exposed on the outside of the wall.
• half-timber building: A building framed in timber, the spaces between being filled with bricks or clay, usually found in the more wooded parts of England.
• half-timbered: A technique of wooden-frame construction in which the members are exposed on the outside of the wall.
• half-timbered building: A building constructed with timber frame filled with plaster or brick.
• half-timbering: A technique of wooden-frame construction in which the members are exposed on the outside of the wall.
• headwall: A concrete or masonry retaining wall at the inlet of a drain or culvert.
• hollow masonry wall: An exterior wall consisting of two leaves linked by galvanized metal or iron wall ties; the cavity between the two leaves may or may not contain thermal insulating or moisture-proofing material.
• hollow wall: A wall built in two withes with space between for checking the passage of water, or for insulation; a cavity wall.
• hollow walls: See brick.
• honeycomb wall: A brick wall having a pattern of openings; equal in thickness to the width of one brick; either gaps are left between stretchers or bricks are omitted to provide openings; used to support floor joists and provide ventilation under floors.
• interior wall: Any wall within a building, entirely surrounded by exterior walls.
• kabe: In traditional Japanese architecture, a wall.
• knapped flint: A wall made of flints broken down the middle.
• knee wall: A short wall supporting rafters at some intermediate position along their length.
• load-bearing wall: A wall capable of supporting an imposed load, as from a floor or roof of a building.
• log framing: A type of wooden wall construction.
• Loudon’s hollow wall: See brick.
• maceria: In ancient Roman construction, a rough wall having no facing; constructed in a wide variety of materials.
• masonry load-bearing wall: A masonry wall that carries its own weight as well as other weights, such as that of the roof.
• metal panel wall: Strips of metal, especially chromed metal, are used on paneled walls to organize the elevations into rectangular units and to add contrasting color to the hard mirror finish.
• mud between posts: Also see bousillage-entre-poteaux.
• mud wall: Also see cob wall.
• murus coctilis: A wall built of bricks hardened by fire.
• nonbearing wall: A wall that does not support a vertical load.
• non-load-bearing wall: A wall supporting no load other than its own weight.
• o-kabe: In traditional Japanese architecture, a type of stud wall covered with plaster or boards which hide the structural components.
• outer curtain wall: Exterior defensive wall – outside the inner walls of a medieval fortress.
• pane work: The division of the exterior surface of a house into panes or panels, as constructively, in a half-timbered house by the disposition of its visible timbers, whether arranged so as to form rectangular panes, or, by branching and shaping, to enclose other and more or less decorative shapes as quatrefoils, circles, etc…
• panel wall: A non-load-bearing exterior masonry wall wholly supported at each story.
• parapet wall: That part of a wall which is entirely above the roof.
• paries: In ancient Roman construction, a wall of a house or other edifice. Also see murus.
• paries communis: A party wall.
• paries craticius: A wall made of canes and hurdles, covered with a coating of clay; similar to our lath and plaster walls; used in ancient times for an external wall, and subsequently for a partition in the interior of a house.
• paries dealbatus: An exterior wall which was treated with albarium opus, producing an appearance similar to white marble.
• paries directus: A wall or partition within a building, separating one room from another.
• paries e lapide quadrato: An ashlar wall, consisting of stones cut and squared by a chisel.
• paries formaceus: A pise wall made of rammed earth.
• paries fornicatus: A wall perforated with arched openings to save materials without diminishing its structural integrity.
• paries intergerivus: Also see paries communis.
• paries lateritius: A brick wall; the usual thickness of an ancient Roman exterior wall was 18 inches.
• paries solidus: A blind wall or blank wall.
• parietes: The walls of private rooms of ancient Roman houses; frequently lined with marble; more often covered with paintings.
• partition wall: An interior wall that separates adjacent rooms within a single story of a building, but does not support a load.
• party wall: A wall used jointly by two parties under easement agreement, erected upon a line dividing two parcels of land, each of which is a separate real estate entity; a common wall.
• party-wall: Wall between two buildings (e.g. semi-detached houses) or pieces of land intended for distinct occupation, shared by the two owners, in the use of which each has a partial right. Essentially it is a wall of which the two adjoining owners are tenants-in-common.
• pebble wall: A wall built of pebbles in mortar. 2. A wall faced with pebbles embedded, at random or in pattern, in a mortar coating on the exposed surface.
• perforated wall: See pierced wall.
• peribolos: In Greek architecture, a wall enclosing consecrated grounds, generally in connection with a temple. The area so enclosed. In the Middle Ages, the wall enclosing the choir, the atrium, or any other sacred place; or the other walls surrounding the precinct about a church, and forming the outmost bounds allowed for refuge and sanctuary.
• peribolus: A wall enclosing a sacred area such as a temple or church grounds.
• perpend wall: A wall built of perpends or of ashlar stones, all of which reach from one side to the other. 2. A buttress or pier, projecting from a wall.
• perpeyn wall: A wall built of perpends or of ashlar stones, all of which reach from one side to the other. 2. A buttress or pier, projecting from a wall.
• pierced wall: Also see perforated wall, screen wall.
• pirca: A type of crude wall construction using dry-laid unshaped stones; found in the Andes.
• pise de terre: Walling made of cob – an unburnt brick.
• planter wall: A wall built parallel with a house often on the ground floor level and filled with soil for plants to grow within.
• pony wall: A dwarf wall for supporting floor joists.
• post and pane: Also see post and petrail.
• post and petrail: Also see post and petrail.
• prakaram: In Hindu architecture a wall which encloses a temple compound. 2. The courtyard enclosed by such a wall.
• proscenium wall: In a theatre, or similar building, the wall separating the stage and the auditorium; usually of masonry and very solid. It is in this wall that the proscenium arch is opened.
• rab and dab: Also see wattle and daub.
• rad and dab: Also see wattle and daub.
• retaining wall: A braced or freestanding wall that bears against an earthen backing.
• retaining-wall: Wall, often battered, also called a revetment, preventing a bank of earth, etc., from slipping: it is found in the form of battered arched piers at the back of which are segmental concave walls (like vaults) to resist the pressure behind them, often associated with 19th c. railway architecture. 2. Dam.
• return wall: A short wall perpendicular to the end of a longer wall.
• rip rap wall: A stone wall without regularity of structure; as used in deep water.
• rowlock cavity wall: Cavity wall of brick in which all brick in both withes are laid on edge.
• sawtooth wall: A pattern used on wooden walling.
• screen wall: A screen of some solidity as differing from one which is pierced, especially in the intercolumniations of a colonnade.
• sea wall: A retaining wall set where the land has to be protected against the waves of the sea.
• sheathing wall: Wooden walling.
• shingle wall: A type of exterior wooden walling.
• shin-kabe: In traditional Japanese architecture, a type of plastered wall in which the structural members are exposed.
• slurry wall: A concrete wall cast in a trench to serve as sheeting and often as a permanent foundation wall, constructed by excavating a trench in short lengths, filling it with a slurry of bentonite and water to prevent the sidewalls from collapsing, setting reinforcement, and placing concrete in the trench with a tremie to displace the slurry.
• springing wall: Same as a buttress.
• spur wall: A short wall extending out from a main wall.
• stud and mud: Same as wattle and daub.
• stud wall: A wall or partition framed with studs and faced with sheathing, siding, wallboard, or plasterwork. Also called stud partition.
• surface bonding: The bonding of a concrete masonry wall by stacking the units without mortar and troweling on a stucco-like compound of white portland cement and glass fiber.
• talud: In Mesoamerican architecture, an outer wall (or façade) which slopes inward with increasing height of a structure. This feature first appeared at the Olmec site of La Venta, Tabasco (Mexico), ca. 800 B.C.
• talus wall: A wall having an inclined face; a battered wall.
• tappia: Wall-construction of earth rammed in formwork, often with added lime and gravel, finished with several coats of limewash.
• terrones work: A wall or building constructed of earth, mud, adobe, or similar compact and uniform material which hardens as it dries.
• trombe wall: A massive masonry wall, usually painted black, used to absorb and store the sun’s heat in energy conscious houses.
• veneered wall: A wall having a nonstructural facing attached but not bonded to a supporting structure.
• wall: Any of various upright constructions presenting a continuous surface and serving to enclose, divide, or protect an area.
• wall tie bonded cavity wall: An exterior wall consisting of two leaves linked by galvanized metal or iron wall ties; the cavity between the two leaves may or may not contain thermal insulating or moisture-proofing material.
• walls: Any of various upright constructions presenting a continuous surface and serving to enclose, divide, or protect an area.
• wattle: A framework of interwoven rods, poles, or branches.
• wattle and dab: Building with wattle work plastered with clay or mud.
• wattle and daub: A method of construction with thin branches (wattles) plastered over with clay mud (daub).
• wattle-and-dab: Interwoven staves and twigs used to fill a panel in a timber frame, providing a backing for a finish of daub (clay, dung, or mud) or plaster (usually on straw or hair), which is then lime-washed. It is also used in roofs beneath thatch, in which case it is underthatch wattling.
• wattle-and-daub: A method of construction with thin branches (wattles) plastered over with clay mud (daub).
• wattle-and-daub house: A method of construction with thin branches (wattles) plastered over with clay mud (daub).
• wattling: A method of construction by the interweaving of boughs, rods, canes, withes, vines, etc.
• window wall: A nonbearing wall composed primarily of vertical and horizontal framing members containing a combination of fixed lights and operating sashes.
• wing wall: A wall down slope of motte to protect stairway.
• wing-wall: A wall down slope of motte to protect stairway.
• ying pi: A free-standing wall, either inside or outside the main entrance of a Chinese building courtyard; usually constructed of masonry, but may be of wood or clay; used to block vision, providing greater privacy and a windbreak; the middle section of these walls carried decorative reliefs. Also called chao ch’iang or chao pi.

Also see Architecture index.