Forged Decorative Screen Set Into a Wall Opening

Project Overview

A forged decorative screen set into an interior wall opening, dividing one space from the next without closing it off. The frame is a grid of round bar, and each bay is filled with forged scrolls, circles and arched forms arranged so the pattern reads differently from either side as the light behind it changes.

Because the opening looks through into a lit corridor, the screen is seen mostly as a silhouette. That drove the whole design: the pattern had to hold up as a flat black shape rather than rely on surface detail or finish.

What We Built

• A round bar grid frame sized to the wall opening and fitted into its full thickness
• Forged scroll, circle and arch infill worked individually into each bay
• Shaped decorative bands across the head and sill of the screen
• Forged collars at the bar intersections instead of ground-flush welds

The Detail That Matters

The bars are joined with forged collars — short wrapped bands closed around the junction where two bars cross — rather than welded and ground smooth. It is slower than welding and it is the whole point. A ground weld tries to hide the joint and, close up, always looks like something that has been hidden. A collar admits the joint and makes it part of the pattern, so the screen reads as assembled rather than moulded.

It also holds up under the conditions this piece is seen in. On a screen lit from behind, a filled and ground junction shows as a thickened blob in the silhouette; a collar shows as a deliberate band.

Installation

The screen sits inside the depth of the wall opening rather than against the face of it, so the reveal on both sides has to be consistent and the frame has to be square to an opening that was formed in plaster rather than machined. It was fitted as a single assembly.

Project Gallery

Forged and laser-cut interior screens sit in the same family; see decorative screens and room dividers for the pattern library and mounting formats.