Undulating Ceiling Caused by a Leak in the Apartment Above

• e.
  September 10th, 2007 at 4:07 pm

  As someone who is just recovering from a flood caused by my upstairs bathroom, I can easily say that I would totally prefer this than what happened to my ceiling. Mine disinigrated and killed everything I had downstairs. Horray for drywall!

• twibs
  September 10th, 2007 at 4:42 pm

  Oh ick! The air conditioning leaked above my room and as cool looking as it is, it is NOT FUN.

  It was right over the smoke detector, which started making these scary fizzly beeping noises, then water started dripping really slowly, water torture style. And the bulge made the wall look organic, like something out of a Cronenburg movie.

  Also, to get the water out my dad had to poke the bottom with a stick and then run so it wouldn’t get on him.

• Miss Cellania
  September 10th, 2007 at 5:55 pm

  The water in my ceiling comes right through the light fixture -onto my bed.

• buns and chou
  September 10th, 2007 at 8:08 pm

  kind of looks like casper the friendly ghost!!

• VonSkippy
  September 10th, 2007 at 8:21 pm

  Ceiling condoms - seems like in some places you just can’t be toooooo safe.

• gingrl
  September 10th, 2007 at 8:39 pm

  Ha! This is still better looking than the leak in my old apartment. Noone above me but the (tile shingled) roof leaked causing the inner drywall to buckle until one day it just collaped! Ants were living in the roof and they invaded! Luckly the leak was over the bathtub and easy to clean. I still remember trying to shower with big whole there before the mgt could fix it.

• B.
  September 10th, 2007 at 8:42 pm

  gingrl - Sounds like a catastrophic skylight.

  Honestly, how is it that the ceiling hasn’t broken apart?

• arvana
  September 10th, 2007 at 8:46 pm

  I had a similar experience with a wall, though not nearly as spectacular. There was a leak in an upstairs bathroom and the water ran down the inside of the wall. In one spot, the paint bulged out like a water balloon — it looked exactly like a breast!

• daemon
  September 10th, 2007 at 9:19 pm

  I recall a lovecraft story about a place like this…

• anonymous
  September 10th, 2007 at 9:22 pm

  one wonders what the ceiling is made from…yes? what material would deform like that? water is about 8 pounds per gallon…so that would have to be both very flexible and strong to hold a bulge that pendulous.

  since most every ceiling is made with gypsum board or plaster and some sort of sub-layer (like wood lath), this image appears to suggest some sort of very flexible, rubber-like material.

  that, or photoshop.

• jawakka
  September 10th, 2007 at 10:48 pm

  fake!

• dNA
  September 10th, 2007 at 11:19 pm

  shop’d

• Zeno
  September 10th, 2007 at 11:20 pm

  Soon the apartment will be a pilgrimage destination as the faithful flock to view a manifestation of the nipple of the Virgin Mary.

• CDM
  September 10th, 2007 at 11:24 pm

  It’s a photoshop and a half

• DavidNYC
  September 10th, 2007 at 11:49 pm

  If it’s not fake, then there ought to be other photos of this, from other angles.

• farty
  September 11th, 2007 at 12:13 am

  draw a nipple on that boobie

• Klaus von blowhole
  September 11th, 2007 at 12:16 am

  bllecchh! looks like a boil. What the hell is that ceiling made out of?

• c-dub
  September 11th, 2007 at 12:25 am

  Claims of “Fake!” or “Photoshop!” are nearly always shorthand for “I’m so small-minded and self-centered that I can’t imagine anything beyond my own narrow experience.” The ceilings are made of sheets of PVC stretched on a perimeter frame, most likely made by a French company, Barrisol. You can see a video an installation with a similar problem on their website.

• EH
  September 11th, 2007 at 1:15 am

  That picture squicks me out.

• L
  September 11th, 2007 at 1:42 am

  “Claims of “Fake!” or “Photoshop!” are nearly always shorthand for “I’m so small-minded and self-centered that I can’t imagine anything beyond my own narrow experience.””

  That, or they speak from experience, having fooled their friends with a really good Photoshop prank. People will fall for almost anything. And there are a lot of Photoshopped images out there now.

  Having looked at the other photos on the linked site, though, I’ll say that this appears to be real. Weird, but real.

• Jake
  September 11th, 2007 at 2:15 am

  THIS COULD VERY WELL BE REAL. Several water valves leaked in my house and created this effect in my downstairs water-resistant latex-based ceiling paint, but on a smaller scale. My drywall did not collapse, but where the water did soak through the drywall, the paint pulled away from the ceiling and created a hanging pattern similar to this. The reason why his paint job has not collapsed could be due to extremely durable latex-based paint or several coats of paint. IT MAKES PERFECT SENSE.

• Jake
  September 11th, 2007 at 2:19 am

  To continue the last post, there are other angles at http://cellar.org/iotd.php. To solve my problem, I poked small holes in the bottom of the hanging dimples and drained them. I replaced my leaky faucet valves and have not needed to replace any drywall.

• mmm
  September 11th, 2007 at 5:24 am

  gmafb

• ted
  September 11th, 2007 at 5:58 am

  That looks so obviously fake.

  Either that, or I’m so small-minded and self-centered that I can’t imagine anything beyond my own narrow experience.

• andy
  September 11th, 2007 at 7:52 am

  ceiling boobies!

• Matt Ashburn
  September 11th, 2007 at 4:25 pm

  From my personal experience with a similar ceiling, the bent material is likely a layer latex paint that has filled with water, separated from the gypsum board or plaster ceiling, and is now holding water. I’d suggest grabbing a bucket and poking a hole in it to drain the water.

• GG
  September 11th, 2007 at 5:47 pm

  Same thing happened to the ceiling in the shower at my previous residence. The water from a leak above was, as Matt A. suggests, held by a layer of latex paint. How paint could have the tensile strength to hold that volume of water without rupturing, I can’t say. I was shocked to find myself standing there starkers, looking at just this kind of enormous, surreal bulge from above. Oh, and Matt, a friend and I did indeed hold a large bucket beneath it and sliced the end with a box cutter. Whoosh!

• blue
  September 11th, 2007 at 8:54 pm

  That looks so obviously fake.

  Either that, or I’m so small-minded and self-centered that I can’t imagine anything beyond my own narrow experience.

  or both?

• jc
  September 13th, 2007 at 7:51 pm

  This is fake. Whether its drywall, wood lathe and plaster, or drywall with a plaster coating, the paint and plaster would be cracking due to the stress of that bulge. If it’s between the wall and the paint, even if its latex it wouldn’t hold. Water may not feel heavy in a glass in your hand, however by the looks of how many litres of water being held there, come on. Too much stress to look normal.

• c-dub
  October 16th, 2007 at 11:41 pm

  Again: the ceilings are made of sheets of PVC stretched on a perimeter frame, most likely made by a French company, Barrisol. You can see a video an installation with a similar problem on their website.

• j
  January 30th, 2008 at 12:22 am

  this just happened to my apartment except not as extreme

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