If you saw this post about the empty rooms, you know that I was not lucky enough to be blessed with old awesome fireplaces in our old awesome house. So, I decided to make a fake one to give me the feel of a fireplace without all of the black ashy mess. I absolutely LOVE candles - I love the way they illuminate a room, the way they smell, the way they make me feel... it's a win all the way around for me.
And so we made this:
A faux fireplace!
I'm about to show you exactly how we did it, so pay attention! :)
It all started with this old armoire that I found on Craigslist 5 years ago for like $50.
You can probably see that it became a giant cluster of junk - mostly legos. And I hate how short it is because decorating on top of cabinets like this gives me a headache.
And so I had an idea - let's turn THIS into our fireplace! First thing? Remove the doors and empty the crap. It's another post altogether about where we put all of that crap. And it wasn't in the trash like I was hoping. :(
Side note on the door... isn't this cool? I want to use it above the fireplace - I have plans to paint it and maybe make it into a mercury glass mirror?!? so many possibilities!
Once that was done, we had a much better sense of the work involved. We moved it over to the new "fireplace" room and my lovely husband started by cutting off the legs for me - There was limited cursing (score!) but at some point the beer did make an appearance.
We measured the same distance on all 4 legs and made a line and started hacking away.
side note: any penn staters out there?!? WE ARE!
The legs were cut with a plain old saw, so you can see they were not level or flat. We just took a belt sander to them to even them out. In my head, it didn't matter because this house is so crooked that no matter what I did to these legs, I was going to have to level them with shims anyway. So we just smoothed and leveled the best we could.
Here she is all cut down and in place. Short, but cute!! Initially we thought that we would be able to salvage the upper curvy trim, but it would have complicated our project beyond complicated to make a mantel around that, so we decided to lop it off. Sean is using a chisel to remove the top flat trim piece in this photograph.
We marked a chalk line so that the front was cut level with the top:
And after one pass with a circular saw, we had a flat top!
At this point we centered the cabinet in the room, leveled the cabinet using shims and we used drywall screws to screw right through the back of the cabinet into the wall.
Starting to come together! All we needed now was wood. So off to the big box store we went! My kids LOVE the rides at this store. :)
I didn't take a picture of this part because it was pretty self explanatory, but we bought a piece of birch - beautiful, smooth birch, and we cut it to the size of the mantel. In our case, I knew I was adding crown moulding to the bottom, so I left a 3.5 inch overhang on all sides but the back. This would allow for the crown I had chosen to fit nicely against the new mantel top.
After the mantel top was placed, we started cutting pieces to mitre together on the wall above. We decided to stop the fireplace at the trim you can see on our upper wall, simply because I didn't want to disturb the crown that was already in the room - if I ever change my mind... you know, because that happens occasionally. ;)
Here she is with the mantel and framing above:
And just so you don't think we're all clean all the time:
Next step is tedious, but easy - we added the crown to the bottom of the mantel piece.
When we removed the doors and shelves from the cabinet, the inside was left like a cavernish space. I wanted it to feel like a fireplace, so I used old plywood I had lying around and cut pieces to frame out the inside. I nailed 2x2's inside the box and then the plywood right into those. I also added a wider trim piece to the top front to make the opening more even to the eyes.
Once that was done, we tackled the upper crown moulding. We basically built a mini mantel on the ground and then screwed that into the wall. I wish I had pictures of this part, but I may or may not have run out to the store while this was happening. :)
The last step, which I do not have a picture of unfinished, was to add a piece of pretty trim to the edge of the mantel. This is or trim - purchased at the big box store for $6.
We simply measured and used our nail gun (my favorite) to adhere this right to the unfinished edge of the mantel.
All constructed but not "finished":
Between the step of construction and painting, I used a paintable, non cracking white caulk to caulk all of my seams, my joints, etc. Just to give it that built-in effect. It's important to use paintable caulk, but also in an old house like this, use caulk that won't crack. Otherwise you'll be doing this every year. :)
Next up: Primer. This is the primer I use for EVERYTHING that has been varnished or poly'd before - your primer has to be a shellac based primer. It dries shiny and smooth but splotchy as heck. It won't matter - nothing is getting through once this stuff is on. But open a window - it's high-inducing!
I primed it and became very impatient to see the finished product... candles, anyone? :) OH, and you can see in this picture I decided to add a little flourish to the moulding at the top. Pretty, no?
After 2 coats of primer, 3 coats of chalk paint and 2 coats of wax, this baby was finished. Whew!
Get building!
I know that I probably omitted some steps in this process - hit me with your questions and I'll answer the best that I can!
~Jessica
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