I’ve always said the kitchen is the heart of the home. And while I’ll stick with that forever and all eternity, I think the second heart of a home, or at least the living room, is the fireplace! Taylor and I always dreamt of a sleek, black fireplace, with a bright white shiplap wall, and a chunky driftwood mantle. When we bought our home a few months ago, this was surely not the case. The walls were a dark coffee brown, and the fireplace (full of ash and soot) was surrounded by dark gray ceramic tiles. It was an honest-to-goodness eye sore in our beautiful new home.
The kitchen was easily our first priority, but we knew soon after that would come a fireplace and hearth remodel. I read a few blog posts from Pinterest about DIY fireplace remodels, and learned so much! It was important to us to stay within a budget around $100 (not including the cost of the mantel itself) yet still achieving our dream! I am so excited to share with you the tools and materials we used, and a step by step guide so you can create your own fireplace upscale!
First things first…let’s get a BEFORE shot in the mix. Note the walls had already been painted white. We used Behr Marquee Cameo White for our walls throughout the house.
Super important to get the dirty work done before any painting. For this fireplace, that meant scooping out all the ash and soot from previous fires that had collected over the years before we bought our home. THIS WAS MESSY. We used a dustpan and a large trash bag, and wore masks to save us from the dust. We also moved our white rug out of the way to protect it during clean up. After the bulk of the soot was trashed, I used our vacuum to grab the rest of the small dust particles.
Next, we taped up the surrounding tile and glass doors. Use painter’s tape, and any sort of plastic you have! Plastic drop cloths from any hardware store would be perfect, but I had some extra bubble wrap in the garage that was already cut in small enough pieces. Be sure to use a dry cloth to clean the doors of your fireplace before painting.
Because the door frames, brass trim, and wood handles were all together such a small area, we chose to spray paint. Highly recommend Rust-Oleum High Heat Tough Protective Enamel in Matte Black. This was easy to use, and gave awesome coverage. Not to mention, safe for the high heat of a fireplace. We also sprayed the inside of the fireplace, coating the bricks and the log holder. When spraying the inside, be sure to cover the glass doors once again with plastic and painter’s tape. The black spray paint dried fairly quickly, and only required 2 coats. About 30 minutes in between each coat; and about 1 hour before we could move on to the next step.
Next, we used a household spray cleaner like Clorox, Windex, or 409 and a dry cloth to clean the surrounding tiles. We prepped the sounding walls and flooring with painter’s tape. Once dry, we used 3-inch Foam Brushes to paint the tiles in Behr Marquee Ultra Pure White Satin Finish. Our local Home Depot paint expert shared with us that our finished ceramic tiles would do well with a paint & primer combo like the Behr Marquee paint we chose. If you’re going for a different color that doesn’t offer a paint/primer combo option, or if you have very glossy tiles, I would recommend using a spray primer like this to prep before painting. This paint took far longer to dry, about 1 hour in between coats. And needed 3 coats to cover the dark gray. Check out our progress shot of just the painted tiles, before even adding the shiplap and mantel!
It was at this point in the project that we took a break. Both of us working full-time, the entire project was not doable in one day off together. The clean-up, black spray paint, and white tile painting took a weekend to start. But, we were already so pleased with the progress!
With any DIY project, it’s so important to find logical pause-points to rest and reflect. Revisit the project later with a refreshed mind and lots of energy!
About a week or two later, we had ONE day before family visiting, and we woke up early with the intention of finishing the fireplace and hearth. We measured our walls and fireplace surround, and headed to Home Depot. There are a few ways to create that authentic farmhouse shiplap look. Home Depot and Lowe’s both offer tongue-and-groove panels of wood intended for shiplap specifically. These panels are about 0.75 inch thick, and can be pricey, depending on how large of an area you need to cover.
We chose to purchase two 0.25 inch thick underlayment plywood sheets each measuring 4’x8′. This gave us the thickness we wanted as it was the same thickness as our already existing tiles. It also was lightweight, easy to cut, and simple to hang with finishing nails. It also was cost effective, as each sheet was only $25.
Using our circular saw, we cut the plywood into 6.5 inch width strips. Shiplap usually ranges anywhere from 4-8 inches in width. We measured the overall height of the wall we were going to cover, and divided that evenly among 14-15 strips, giving us the 6.5 inch thickness. We didn’t want to get to the bottom of the wall and have a board that was cut to be thinner than the rest.
The length of your shiplap boards depend on the length of the wall you’re covering, for us it was 64 inches. In the photo below, you’ll see our pencil markings on the sheets of plywood drawing straight lines for Taylor to follow with the saw. We used a long scrap piece of our vinyl flooring to help us measure a straight line. We made a total of 14 strips. 9 of which were 64 inches long. The remaining 5 strips were shorter, framing the sides of the fireplace tiles.
After cutting your appropriately sized strips, use a sanding block to smooth the edges and faces of the shiplap boards. Then you’re ready to hang! Yay! Using a stud finder, locate 4 points of contact for your boards to be anchored. If you’re like us and don’t yet own a stud finder, you can use a small nail to hammer into the drywall and simply feel for studs. The sensation of hammering a nail into a solid stud is significantly different than hammering a nail straight through drywall alone. You’ll know when you’re in a stud. While this does make for some extra holes in the wall, this method worked since we’d be covering up those holes with shiplap anyway.
We used 2 inch finishing nails, a hammer, and a level to hang the shiplap, each board requiring 4 nails. Use a few nickels to help space your panels evenly, creating that authentic shiplap look. This was certainly a two-person job.
This part in our progress was so exciting! It was starting to look like our dream fireplace! Before painting, we hung the cleat for our floating shelf mantel. We purchased this Gray Driftwood Mantel from Wayfair on sale for $190. The cleat it came with required 4 points of anchorage into studs, just like the shiplap panels. To hang this, you’ll need a power drill with a drill bit, and the four 2-inch screws included in the mantel packaging. We then painted the whole wall of shiplap with 3 even coats of Behr Marquee Ultra Pure White to match the tile surround. Here’s what it looked like before we hung the mantel!
Note some of the uneven paint at the base of the fireplace. We used a 0.5 inch thick strip of crown molding to use as a white baseboard at the base of the fireplace. You’ll see in the next photo how even of a line it helped create!
And there you have it! Our dream fireplace in reality! Check out our list of tools, materials, and overall budget below!
TOOLS (these we already had!)
- measuring tape
- dust pan
- trash bag
- dry cloth
- cleaning solution like Clorox or 409
- painter’s tape
- plastic drop cloth
- pencil or sharpie
- level
- step stool or chair
- foam paint brushes
- hammer
- block sander
- circular saw
- power drill with drill bit
- 3 nickels for spacing
- a camera to document your progress!
MATERIALS
- 4’x8′ sheets (we used two) of 0.25 inch underlayment plywood
- Behr Marquee Ultra Pure White quart of paint (we used 2)
- 2 inch finishing nails (we used about 50)
WHAT WE SPENT
- Plywood sheets x 2 = approx $50
- Paint x 2 quarts = approx $40 (this could easily be cheaper using a lower quality paint)
- Wayfair mantel = $190 (also wide variety of prices for floating shelf mantels)
OVERALL COST: $280
OVERALL TIME: approx 3-4 DAYS
