Columns, an important architectural feature throughout much of history, are being used more frequently inside the home today. With a touch of elegance, they open up visual space and yet preserve distinct areas within the home.
A column normally has three parts:
the capital, shaft, and base.
The capital is the top section. The shaft is the long slender part of the column. It can be round, fluted, or square. The base is the support at the bottom of the column.
Following rules established by the Greeks and Romans during the Classical Period of architecture, columns today usually come in three types: Doric, Ionic, and Corinthian. The Doric is the oldest and simplest of the Greek column forms. It has no base, a rather stout shaft, and a plain capital. The shaft of the Ionic is more delicately proportioned, but its main identifying feature is a spiral, scroll-shaped ornament in the capital called a "volute." The Corinthian is still more delicate in appearance because the shaft is proportionally more slender. The Corinthian capital is more ornate and is decorated with ornamentation representing the leaves of the acanthus plant.Column shafts today come in a wide variety of materials, from natural materials like stone and wood, to metals like aluminum, to man-made materials like structural fiberglass, polyurethane and polyethylene.The bases and capitals are purchased separately. Capitals may be made of plaster, resin, or aluminum. Bases are made from plaster, polyethylene, or polyurethane.The man-made materials are especially well-suited for interior columns and can be finished to give almost any effect imaginable.
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