Would you expect joinery shop skirting to bow??

[RobinBHM]

I thought they may have used better wood, or decent wood may have been requsted as it is a more traditional property but then re-read post and they do shop fitting so probably use more man made boards and stuff than wood and a lot of kit stuff.

when I was doing joinery, I tended to do mdf on wide skirting ifI could persuade the customer. The problem is mdf knocks out HSS cutters quite quickly, so either do mould in timber and plant onto the flat section in mdf, or resharpen the cutters every so often.

 

[Spectric]

Another way to get a fancy skirting without having to cut heavy profiles and risk wood movement would be to use a built up moulding along the lines of what Robin is saying except it would be sort of hollow. It seems more common with our american colleagues as it appears in most trim books from over there where they use " furring strips " that run horizontal which is covered by a simple board, and then the top finished with one, two or three pieces of trim depending on what you want.