24 Vaulted Ceiling Designs For A Dramatic And Elegant Living Room

Vaulted ceilings are a popular feature of today's home renovation projects for good reason. They can make just about any room feel more spacious and airy, and they're great for bringing in more natural light. They also fit in well with all sorts of interior design aesthetics, including just about everything from modern minimalism to the more rustic, country-style arrangements that you'd find in mountain cabins. With the right lighting and design choices, vaulted ceilings can even create a sense of opulence, or otherwise establish a luxurious vibe within your home. However, there is one clear downside to these ceiling designs though, and that's their price tag. A vaulted ceiling can cost anywhere between $10,000 and $35,000, with variances occurring due to the size of the project, the materials, and the current structure of the home. But even though vaulted ceilings can be expensive, they're often worth the investment, as long as you have a clear plan for your ceiling's design.

There are tons of exciting ways to customize a vaulted ceiling during the construction process. Wood panels and interesting paint colors can lend this architectural feature a unique look that ultimately gives your living room more character. Beams, fireplaces, and transom windows can also be excellent additions to the overhead space that comes with vaulted interiors. There are plenty of elegant lighting designs to explore for your vaulted ceiling, too. The possibilities are practically limitless, so long as you're enlisting the aid of a professional contractor.

Wooden ceiling panels are great for classic-looking spaces that place an emphasis on natural colors and materials. Like other wooden design and decor elements, they will help to establish a calm and relaxing environment for your living room. Wood ceiling panels can also be suitable for modern interiors as well. However, it's best to use light wood colors and stains when you're installing these fixtures in these kinds of interiors. That's because darker wood is more likely to seem rustic and traditional. It's worth noting that dark ceiling panels can make your space appear smaller as well.

If you have patio doors along one end of your living room, you can use the extra vertical space that comes with a vaulted ceiling to install a set of transom windows. These kinds of windows are the sort that are located directly above doors, and are exactly as wide as the doors' frames. They're often rectangular and small, but when you install them in a living room with a vaulted ceiling, their sides will angle in accordance with the slope of the roof, and they can let in a ton of extra natural light.

Skylights are one of the best ways to increase the amount of natural light in your living room. Like vaulted ceilings themselves, they make your interiors feel more spacious, luxurious, and welcoming. However, there are a couple things you should consider before you put skylights on the sloped section of your roof. For starters, you'll have to think about where the light is going to be at certain hours of the day. Another consideration is that you will likely have to position your furniture or your television in a certain arrangement to reduce glare.

White might seem like a plain and uninspiring ceiling color at first glance, but it actually comes with a number of unique advantages from a design perspective. It's a neutral color, so it blends in well with all sorts of interior decor elements, and allows the features of your vaulted ceiling to shine. It's also good at hiding small cracks and blemishes on the ceiling, which essentially means it helps the house look newer for longer. It can even aid you with preventing your small or narrow living room from looking cramped or cluttered.

Installing a stone fireplace that extends up to the peak of your vaulted ceiling is an excellent way to establish a luxurious yet cozy anchor within your space. Accompany this statement fixture with a beautiful tiled or stone slab hearth, and you'll get the perfect centerpiece– not just for your living room, but for your entire home. There are also plenty of other creative fireplace makeovers that you might want to try, and with a vaulted ceiling, you'll have plenty of room to experiment with a wide variety of materials and designs.

Not all vaulted ceiling beams exist for a purely structural purpose; oftentimes, their presence is actually more for highlighting the height and dramatic slope of the ceiling instead. In fact, a few narrow, glossy wooden beams might be all you need for giving a modern, minimalist-style room with a vaulted ceiling more character. If you instead opt for wider beams, or for a series of crossbeams, you might accidentally create more of a rustic, cabin-style look. In essence, scaling back on the beams could be what allows your ceiling to truly soar.

Not all vaulted ceilings reach upwards to a perfectly centered peak. Sometimes, they can have a series of sloped overhead segments instead. A vaulted area that looks somewhat like a trapezoid, with a flat top, could help soften the look of your living room just a touch. This could be especially perfect for homes that lean towards a more contemporary or traditional design style. A flat middle section of the ceiling also could make installing light fixtures, fans, and other hanging decor elements just a bit easier as well.

Dormer windows are elegant architectural features, and not just on the outside of your home. If you have a high-vaulted ceiling, they might look incredible from the inside of the home, too. They differ from skylights in that they stand up vertically and jut outwards from the roof, rather than running parallel with its slope. Because they require more structural changes to install, dormers can be more expensive than skylights. However, they can increase curb appeal, assist with ventilation, and ultimately add more value to the home. And of course, they offer incredible aesthetic appeal.

Not all vaulted ceilings are cathedral ceilings; in some cases, they're shaped more like a dome. Although a dome vault design doesn't add quite the same amount of overhead space as a classic cathedral-style design, it can have just as stunning an effect on the look and feel of the interior. The swooping outline of a dome pairs well with arched doorways and curved furniture. Together, they establish a cohesive flow for the space that's tough to replicate. This sort of vaulted ceiling is pretty much a guaranteed conversation-starter.

A vaulted ceiling usually gives you plenty of room for experimenting with large, eye-catching light fixtures. Chandeliers, in particular, are often particularly well-suited for this sort of space. Their magnificent, twinkling designs can give your home the perfect boost of glamour and luxury. In addition, they're fantastic focal points. Large pendant lights and wall sconces can also look nice if you'd prefer a slightly less dramatic approach for your living room's decor style. And they'll look particularly glamorous hanging from the top of your vaulted ceiling.

All sorts of spaces can get an aesthetic boost from exposed wooden ceiling beams. These kinds of fixtures connect one end of the room with another, and put elegant stains and wood graining on display while doing so. They're just as good for Victorian-style homes as they are for log cabins and modern barn-style interiors. They can establish a cottagecore or country look, but if you paint them, they will still suit contemporary spaces as well. No matter what home they're in, exposed ceiling beams have a distinct, undeniable degree of charm.

Want to highlight the verticality and slope of your vaulted ceiling while still complementing your modern or minimalist decor? Installing LED strip lights might be the perfect way to do just that. If you have a recessed cove where the slope of your ceiling meets the top of your wall, then you already have the perfect place to put these fixtures. However, you could also lay them out on any of the exposed beams in your ceiling vault to highlight their shape. Alternatively, you could even fit them on your transom window sills.

A splash of dark paint for the walls in your living room might help you elevate the design of your ceiling vault without actually changing a single thing about it. The rich, bold hues of a dark blue or green wall will isolate the sloping part of the ceiling so that it ends up contrasting with the rest of the space. However, before you stock up on cans of your favorite paint, it's important to know the tips for creating a cohesive color palette for your home.

If you don't want to paint the walls, you could instead paint the windowsills and beams in the vaulted part of your ceiling black. This will create a dramatic color contrast with the white surface of the ceiling. The combination of these two opposite colors will give your space a classic yet modern design that will stand the test of time. The black tones may also help highlight the slope and scale of your vault as well. This ceiling arrangement could be a particularly fantastic choice for minimalist homes.

Floating shelves aren't always just handy storage solutions — they're often beautiful decorative fixtures as well. They're perfect for books, art pieces, and framed photos. If you select wood floating shelves that match the color and graining of your wood beams, your living room is sure to have a gorgeous, cohesive look that makes your guests envious. With a vaulted ceiling, you can also install the shelves a bit higher up, near to where the ceiling begins to slope inwards. That way, your shelves will highlight the luxurious amount of vertical space you have.

Planning to build a custom home with a covered patio that's connected to the living room? You could extend the vaulted ceiling that's in your indoor living space so that it covers your outdoor living space as well. Then you can fit large glass windows around and above the patio doors, so that the vaulted ceilings in the two areas look like they're seamlessly connected. This design will also allow plenty of natural light to enter your home, which will give your open floor plan a flowing, borderless feel that's refreshingly modern.

A barrel vault ceiling effectively has the profile of a long arch. From the inside of the home, the roof appears to slope inwards at an angle from the room's longer sides. This design contrasts with the more common cathedral-style ceiling vaults, in which the vaulted parts of the ceiling run upwards at a consistent pitch, and then meet at a peak in the center. A barrel vault could be perfect for creating a cozy living room in a finished basement. However, no matter where you install yours, it's sure to provide serious wow factor.

A vaulted ceiling that encompasses not just the living room, but the kitchen and dining room as well, will help accentuate the best features of an open floor plan. For homeowners that can afford it, and for homes that can accommodate it, this arrangement offers lots of aesthetic benefits. There will be plenty of natural light, and the center of the home will feel more luxurious. The overall structure of the home itself will appear to be on display as well, especially if there are ceiling beams or columns present.

Dark, richly-colored wood beams, a steep sloping roof, and ornate traditional interiors are all hallmarks of a classic Tudor home. These European-inspired design features can all support the use of vaulted ceilings, and make them look incredibly dramatic. You can also bring the half-timber design from the outside of a Tudor house inside in order to decorate a vault wall. Your ceiling beams can cross the room horizontally and outline the ceiling's pitch vertically. You could also hang up an elegant chandelier and install some vintage wall sconces to complete the look.

Shiplap panels are a durable, reasonably priced material that you can use for establishing a cozy cottage-style aesthetic within your space. Many homeowners put them up on their walls to accent their home decor style without making too much of a splash. They're not overly bold; they're beautifully subtle instead. As it turns out, shiplap can complement the architecture of a vaulted ceiling quite nicely. It could also be a nice option for giving your walls and your ceilings a single, uniform texture, without having to bother with paint.

If you want to utilize a chic industrial design style for arranging your home, you'll probably want to add some dramatic metal accent pieces to your space. Your vaulted ceiling's beams might be a great place to start. If they're made from a glossy black metal, they will look especially striking. They'll probably also contrast neatly with the other elements of your living room that are made from different materials, such as your couches, chairs, and wooden floors. Just make sure to choose a ceiling fan that matches the metal.

Not all vaulted ceilings have to utilize the same pitch on both sides of the room. Sometimes, one slope of the ceiling will be more drawn out, so that it spans the majority of the space. In a custom-built home, the two differently-sloped sections of the ceiling could reach toward the center of the room, and then be connected by a small, overhead wall. The vertical surface in the vaulted part of the ceiling that this design creates is a great place to install more windows. The overall look is stunningly unique.

Installing recessed lighting in your ceiling's vault is a great way to illuminate your space without relying on chandeliers or other hanging light fixtures, which can, in certain spaces, look a bit gaudy. However, you should always check to make sure that the recessed lights you're buying are specifically designed for sloped ceilings. If you installed a regular recessed light in your ceiling vault, it would shine directly into your eyes all the time. Essentially, your lights need to be adjustable, so that they point directly downwards, towards the floor.

When you're building a custom home for your family, the possibilities for what you can do with your space are practically endless. One especially stunning architectural style that you can consider if you love vaulted ceilings is that of the A-frame house. With this sort of design, the slope of the roof begins at ground level, so that the entire interior is defined by the angular nature of the ceiling and the walls, which are effectively one. High windows, loft levels, and open floor plans are must-haves with this structure.