List of roof shapes

Last updated December 05, 2024

Roof shapes include flat (or shed), gabled, hipped, arched, domed, and a wide variety of other configurations detailed below.^[1]

Roof shapes

Flat: These are found in traditional buildings in regions with a low precipitation. Modern materials which are highly impermeable to water make possible the low-pitch roofs found on large commercial buildings. Although referred to as flat they are generally gently pitched.
- Roof terrace (including roof garden)
Single-pitched roof
- Shed roof (lean-to, pent roof,^[2] skirt roof, outshot, skillion, mono-roof^[3]): A roof with one slope, historically attached to a taller wall.
- Saw-tooth: Multiple single-pitched roofs arrayed in a row, sometimes seen on factories.^[4]
Multi-pitched roof:
- Gable (ridged, dual-pitched, peaked, saddle, pack-saddle, saddleback,^[5] span roof^[6]): A simple roof design shaped like an inverted V.
  - Cross gabled: The result of joining two or more gabled roof sections together, forming a T or L shape for the simplest forms, or any number of more complex shapes.
  - See also roof pitch, crow-stepped, corbie stepped, stepped gable: A gable roof with its end parapet walls below extended slightly upwards and shaped to resemble steps.
- A-frame
- Half-hipped (clipped gable, jerkinhead^[7]): A combination of a gable and a hip roof (pitched roof without changes to the walls) with the hipped part at the top and the gable section lower down.
- Dutch gable, gablet: A hybrid of hipped and gable with the gable (wall) at the top and hipped lower down; i.e. the opposite arrangement to the half-hipped roof. Overhanging eaves forming shelter around the building are a consequence where the gable wall is in line with the other walls of the buildings; i.e., unless the upper gable is recessed.
- Saltbox, catslide: A gable roof with one side longer than the other, and thus closer to the ground unless the pitch on one side is altered.
- Bonnet roof: A reversed gambrel or Mansard roof with the lower portion at a lower pitch than the upper portion.
- Monitor roof: A roof with a monitor; 'a raised structure running part or all of the way along the ridge of a double-pitched roof, with its own roof running parallel with the main roof.'
- Butterfly roof (V-roof,^[8] London roof^[9]): A V-shaped roof resembling an open book. A kink separates the roof into two parts running towards each other at an obtuse angle.
- Karahafu: A type of gable found in some traditional Japanese buildings.
- Hidden roof: A type of Japanese roof construction.
- Hip, hipped: A hipped roof is sloped in two pairs of directions (e.g. N–S and E–W) compared to the one pair of direction (e.g. N–S or E–W) for a gable roof.
- Cross hipped: The result of joining two or more hip roof sections together, forming a T or L shape for the simplest forms, or any number of more complex shapes.
- Satari: A Swedish variant on the monitor roof; a double hip roof with a short vertical wall usually with small windows, popular from the 17th century on formal buildings.^{[ citation needed ]} (Säteritak in Swedish.)
- Mansard (French roof): A roof with the pitch divided into a shallow slope above a steeper slope. The steep slope may be curved. An element of the Second Empire architectural style (Mansard style) in the U.S.
- Neo-Mansard, Faux Mansard, False Mansard, Fake Mansard: Common in the 1960s and 70s in the U.S., these roofs often lack the double slope of the Mansard roof and are often steeply sloped walls with a flat roof. Unlike the Second Empire, where upper story windows were contained within dormers, Neo-Mansard roofs have window openings cut through the steep slope of the lower roof, forming a recessed window.
- Gambrel, curb, kerb: A roof similar to a mansard but sloped in one direction rather than both.
- Bell-cast (sprocketed, flared): A roof with the shallow slope below the steeper slope at the eaves. Compare with bell roof.
- East Asian hip-and-gable roof
- Mokoshi: A Japanese decorative pent roof
- Pavilion roof : A low-pitched roof hipped equally on all sides and centered over a square or regular polygonal floor plan.^[10] The sloping sides rise to a peak. For steep tower roof variants use Pyramid roof.
- Pyramid roof: A steep hip roof on a square building.
- Pyatthat: A multi-tiered and spired roof commonly found in Burmese royal and Buddhist architecture.
- Tented: A type of polygonal hipped roof with steeply pitched slopes rising to a peak
- Helm roof, Rhenish helm: A pyramidal roof with gable ends; often found on church towers.
- Spiral, a steeply pitched spire which twists as it goes up.
- Barrel, barrel-arched (cradle, wagon): A round roof like a barrel (tunnel) vault.
- Catenary: An arched roof in the form of a catenary curve.
- Arched roof, bow roof,^[11] Gothic, Gothic arch, and ship's bottom roof. Historically also called a compass roof.^[12]^[13]
Circular
- Bell roof (bell-shaped, ogee, Philibert de l'Orme roof): A bell-shaped roof. Compare with bell-cast eaves.
- Domed
- Onion dome or rather an imperial roof
- Bochka roof
- Conical roof or cone roof
Hyperbolic
- Saddle

Illustrations


Flat roof	Single-pitched (shed, skillion) roof	Gable roof	Gable roof with catslide

Ridged, multi-gable or m-type roof	Gambrel roof	Clerestory roof	Saw-tooth roof

Hip roof	Half-hip roof	Tented or pavilion roof	Gablet roof or Dutch gable example with recessed (upper) gable and eaves

Rhombic roof/Rhenish helm	Arched roof	Barrel roof	Bow roof

Conical roof	Spire	Onion dome	Welsh spire

Gable roof with eaves	Cross-gabled building with squatter projecting wing and T-shaped plan	Hip and pent hip roof ( Brit: hipped)	Butterfly roof or trough roof (rare)

Prow or "flying" Gable roof	Monitor roof	Compluvium roof	Displuvium roof (rare)

Hemisperical dome (on a wall)	Sail vault	Compound dome	Cloister vault

Selection criteria

Climate
Location
Material availability
Material cost
Installation cost
Neighbouring buildings
Building geometry
Aesthetics
Engineering concerns
Functionality
Local customs
restrictive covenants
Building codes

Gallery

Arched roof, also called a Gothic arch, and ship's bottom roof, Weston, Oregon
A bonnet roof with lower pitched lower slopes at a lower pitch, as seen on traditional barns in the western United States, Grand Teton National Park, Wyoming
Parabolic curved roof, Keleti Railway Station, Budapest, Hungary
Collegiate Gothic style roof of the Sage Hall at Cornell Central Campus
Flat roof, Western Australia
Mansard roof on a county jail, Mount Gilead, Ohio
A helm roof on the towers of the Limburger Dom, Germany
Gable roof with eaves, exposed, decorated rafters and soffits, and stepped ascending apexes, temple in Chiang Mai, Thailand.
Conical Chinese roof, Nanhai Academy, Taipei
A conical dry-stone roof on a Trullo hut, Apulia, Italy
Cross gabled roof at the Verla mill village and a UNESCO World Heritage Site in Kouvola
Basic mansard roof with dormer windows
Curved form of a mansard roof with bell-cast eaves, Rommersdorf Abbey, Rheinland-Pfalz, Germany
A common form of gambrel roof, Captain Joseph Atwood house, 1752; now part of the Atwood House Museum, Chatham, Massachusetts, US
A less common form of gambrel roof with a curved lower roof slope with supporting curved soffits and thick tiles, Altnau, Switzerland
An ogee-curved roof, in both axes, Montacute Lodge, England
South Korean Woljeongsa Octagonal Nine Story Pagoda
A pyramid roof with a chimney exiting the peak, The Round House, Finchingfield, Essex, England
Beehive roof, a traditional Syrian form
A pent roof is a lower roof attached to a wall
A Swedish Sateri is hipped and pent-hipped with two layers of eaves
Rounded pyramidal roof on a charchala style temple in India
A spiraled church tower roof, cloister, Loiret, France

Related Research Articles

A roof is the top covering of a building, including all materials and constructions necessary to support it on the walls of the building or on uprights, providing protection against rain, snow, sunlight, extremes of temperature, and wind. A roof is part of the building envelope.

A mansard or mansard roof is a multi-sided gambrel-style hip roof characterised by two slopes on each of its sides, with the lower slope at a steeper angle than the upper, and often punctured by dormer windows. The steep roofline and windows allow for additional floors of habitable space, and reduce the overall height of the roof for a given number of habitable storeys. The upper slope of the roof may not be visible from street level when viewed from close proximity to the building.

A dormer is a roofed structure, often containing a window, that projects vertically beyond the plane of a pitched roof. A dormer window is a form of roof window.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Gable</span> Architectural feature

A gable is the generally triangular portion of a wall between the edges of intersecting roof pitches. The shape of the gable and how it is detailed depends on the structural system used, which reflects climate, material availability, and aesthetic concerns. The term gable wall or gable end more commonly refers to the entire wall, including the gable and the wall below it. Some types of roof do not have a gable. One common type of roof with gables, the 'gable roof', is named after its prominent gables.

A rafter is one of a series of sloped structural members such as steel beams that extend from the ridge or hip to the wall plate, downslope perimeter or eave, and that are designed to support the roof shingles, roof deck, roof covering and its associated loads. A pair of rafters is called a couple. In home construction, rafters are normally made of wood. Exposed rafters are a feature of some traditional roof styles.

A tented roof is a type of polygonal hipped roof with steeply pitched slopes rising to a peak. Tented roofs, a hallmark of medieval religious architecture, were widely used to cover churches with steep, conical roof structures.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Gambrel</span> Four-sloped roof

A gambrel or gambrel roof is a usually symmetrical two-sided roof with two slopes on each side. The upper slope is positioned at a shallow angle, while the lower slope is steep. This design provides the advantages of a sloped roof while maximizing headroom inside the building's upper level and shortening what would otherwise be a tall roof, as well as reducing the span of each set of rafters. The name comes from the Medieval Latin word gamba, meaning horse's hock or leg. The term gambrel is of American origin, the older, European name being a curb roof.

Roof pitch is the steepness of a roof expressed as a ratio of inch(es) rise per horizontal foot, or as the angle in degrees its surface deviates from the horizontal. A flat roof has a pitch of zero in either instance; all other roofs are pitched.

This page is a glossary of architecture.

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A hip roof, hip-roof or hipped roof, is a type of roof where all sides slope downward to the walls, usually with a fairly gentle slope, with variants including tented roofs and others. Thus, a hipped roof has no gables or other vertical sides to the roof.

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References

↑ Long, George. "Roof". The Penny cyclopaedia of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge. London: Charles Knight, 18331843. 143. Print.
↑ Harris, Cyril M.. "Pent roof". Harris dictionary of architecture & construction. 3rd ed. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2000. Print.
↑ Cowan, Henry J., and Peter R. Smith. "Shed roof" Dictionary of architectural and building technology. London: Elsevier Applied Science Publishers; 1986. 272. Print.
↑ "The Machine Shop and the Works. Modern Principles of Design", The Times: Engineering Supplement, London, November 13, 1912, p.25.
↑ Fleming, Honour, & Pevsner, A Dictionary of Architecture
↑ Passmore, Augustine C. (1904). "Span Roof". Handbook of technical terms used in architecture and building and their allied trades and subjects. London: Scott, Greenwood, and Co. 325. Print.
↑ "A Crash Course in Jerkinhead Roofs".
↑ Passmore, Augustine C. "V Roof". Handbook of technical terms used in architecture and building and their allied trades and subjects. London: Scott, Greenwood, and Co.;, 1904. 362. Print.
↑ Coutts, John. Loft Conversions. 2nd ed. New York: Wiley, 2012. Print.
↑ Pavilion roof, polygonal roof, see builder bill glossary
↑ Davies, Nikolas, and Erkki Jokiniemi. Dictionary of architecture and building construction. Amsterdam: Elsevier/Architectural Press, 2008.304
↑ "Rainbow roof | Article about rainbow roof by The Free Dictionary". encyclopedia2.thefreedictionary.com. Retrieved 2018-10-26.
↑ Roof Repair

External links

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[1] Long, George. "Roof". The Penny cyclopaedia of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge. London: Charles Knight, 18331843. 143. Print.

[2] Harris, Cyril M.. "Pent roof". Harris dictionary of architecture & construction. 3rd ed. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2000. Print.

[3] Cowan, Henry J., and Peter R. Smith. "Shed roof" Dictionary of architectural and building technology. London: Elsevier Applied Science Publishers; 1986. 272. Print.

[4] "The Machine Shop and the Works. Modern Principles of Design", The Times: Engineering Supplement, London, November 13, 1912, p.25.

[5] Fleming, Honour, & Pevsner, A Dictionary of Architecture

[6] Passmore, Augustine C. (1904). "Span Roof". Handbook of technical terms used in architecture and building and their allied trades and subjects. London: Scott, Greenwood, and Co. 325. Print.

[7] "A Crash Course in Jerkinhead Roofs".

[8] Passmore, Augustine C. "V Roof". Handbook of technical terms used in architecture and building and their allied trades and subjects. London: Scott, Greenwood, and Co.;, 1904. 362. Print.

[9] Coutts, John. Loft Conversions. 2nd ed. New York: Wiley, 2012. Print.

[10] Pavilion roof, polygonal roof, see builder bill glossary

[11] Davies, Nikolas, and Erkki Jokiniemi. Dictionary of architecture and building construction. Amsterdam: Elsevier/Architectural Press, 2008.304

[thefreedictionary-12] "Rainbow roof | Article about rainbow roof by The Free Dictionary". encyclopedia2.thefreedictionary.com. Retrieved 2018-10-26.

[13] Roof Repair

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v t e Roofs
Roof shapes	Arched roof Barrel roof Board roof Bochka roof Bow roof Butterfly roof Clerestory Conical roof Dome Flat roof Gable roof Gablet roof Gambrel roof Half-hipped roof Hip roof Onion dome Mansard roof Pavilion roof Rhombic roof Ridged roof Saddle roof Sawtooth roof Shed roof Tented roof
Roof elements	Air conditioning unit Attic Catslide Chimney Collar beam Dormer Eaves Flashing Gable Green roof Gutter Hanging beam Joist Lightning rod Loft Purlin Rafter Ridge vent Roof batten Roof garden Roofline Roof ridge Roof sheeting Roof tiles Roof truss Roof window Skylight Soffit Solar panels Spire Weathervane Wind brace