Design help; fireplace edition

Adding a fireplace as part of a living room renovation.  I have a while to think about what I want to put on the outside.  Looking for suggestions on a veneer to put on the outside of the enclosure

Design aesthetic for this room will be English club/cottage meets log cabin.  Rustic but not country.  Take the English club and remove the opulence, or take the log cabin and go one step cleaner/crisper/tidy.

Seating will likely be club style... and I don't mean dance club, I mean the british gentleman's club where they have handlebar moustaches and wear red velour smoking jackets and say things like "bully, old chap" and "indeed" while they sip brandy.  The thick, tufted wingback leather chair with the brass buttons on the armrest.

Pics for research.

Having shown you all of that, my room is pretty small; 12' x 18', and the fireplace is equally small.  Materials I have considered:  a stone veneer like a drystack ledgestone, pickled copper sheet, river rock (although I don't know how to do that without the rock completely being too bulky for the small area), and briefly considered just plywood with a walnut veneer and some moulding to make it look like raised panels.

Here are pictures of the actual fireplace in my house along with a quick sketchup of the final construction. Ignore the shelves.  That's not what they'll look like.  The mantle is a 2.5" thick live-edge slab of walnut and the hearth will be a natural stone of some sort, most likely slate.  Help me pick a material to make this a rustic, comfy, warm, inviting feature.  No concern with flammability, but a nod should go to not adding 50,000 BTUs of kindling to my house.

Here's a better sketchup of the mantle and shelves.

I'd like to rebuild my fireplace as well, so I've looked at quite a few design ideas.

I don't think the smaller chimeny chase works. 

Out here in the southwest, you'll occasionally see tapered chases, but as whole, they are the same width top and bottom. If I was going to run a chase that was smaller like that, I'd probably just expose the pipe for a mechanical look. 

It would work better if it didn't have any side shelves and just had the large mantel on top.

That's quite a mix of design aesthetic. I wouldn't do the river rock. Too big, overpowering. Stacked stone would be very nice, but not unusual. I like your idea of copper sheeting. Maybe a design that uses wrought iron as trim? 

The chimney has to be in a chase in living spaces for code reasons.  Probably so your cat doesn't catch fire.

And actually the chase will be mostly obscured by a TV.  The additional mantle space behind the TV will be critical for router, NAS, etc.  The shelves will hold receiver, Knick knacks, and decorative items.

I suppose I could taper it a bit to give the look without giving up too much real estate.  What I'm really trying to avoid is dominating the room with a massive structure.  I'm afraid a complete floor-to-ceiling wall would be visually oppressive.

Here is a sketchup I did with the TV.  Again, ignore the mantle and shelves.  The walnut slab mantle will extend 18" beyond the box to the left and right with two matching shelves below it.

Ick. No, those side shelves just aren't working. At least as triangles. 

I understand what you're getting at with a visually huge structure in a small room, but the structure "a straight, boxy chase floor to ceiling" is a well understood and expected architectural design component. 

When I think of a fireplace in a living area, I think of floor to ceiling box, with a big mantel to hang Christmas stockings on, maybe some space to mount a TV above, and maybe some built in shelves on either side. 

It's hard to visualize the size of the room. 

Can you take a picture from further back as to see the surrounding area?

Ok, spent a wee bit of time with sketchup to make a tapered chase.

In reply to pheller :

A friend of mine put his flat screen above his fireplace as it seemed like an ideal spot for it. It lasted there for a couple of months before he got tired of constantly looking up at the TV from his couch and lounge chairs. 

If the goal is to create a "sitting room" type feel, then I agree with pheller- the fireplace should be an integrated part of an entire wall assembly.  Rather than a fire place with book shelves, more along the lines of book shelves that happens to have a fireplace in it.

edit: Ok... with the entry door right there, I see your options are more limited.  I still think the minimalist shelving contradicts the "warm and cozy" feeling you seem to be aiming for.

Ian F (Forum Supporter) said:

 

edit: Ok... with the entry door right there, I see your options are more limited.  I still think the minimalist shelving contradicts the "warm and cozy" feeling you seem to be aiming for.

I agree somewhat.  There will actually be two shelves per side which I suppose I could put ends on.  Back to sketchup and I'll see if I can do it.  (not very good with sketchup yet)

Front doors are easy to relocate if you don't have huge porches or concrete stoops. 

Moving that door might allow the whole room to change its orientation and give the fireplace is rightful prominence in the room. 

As it sits, it will always be an awkward entry, whether the chase is square to the ceiling or tapered. 

In your space, the fireplace should've been on the outside long wall. 

Ok, getting blurred vision staring at sketchup.  Added some elements.  I'm thinking in this configuration, the angled shelves don't work.  I would just cut them back to 12" to recess them from the firebox.

How about something less symmetrical?  That space to the right of the fireplace is not big enough for furniture but it seems important to use the space where function is critical in a small space.  My other consideration is that TV's are increasing in size at a rapid rate.  By the time you buy your next tv, it is likely that it will be bigger than the mantle provided in the sketches where the mantle is generally as wide as the fireplace.  

How about taking the mantle all the way out to the right side corner?  Under that mantle then provide a wood storage box for a couple of spare pieces at the floor level and then maybe a shelf at the mid level.  

Im not finding a good example of non symetrical fire place but maybe these will help...  

My goal is just for more mantle length.  But, if your mantle is already cut then this is all moot.  

pheller said:

Front doors are easy to relocate if you don't have huge porches or concrete stoops. 

Not without moving two large windows as well in this house.

Moving that door might allow the whole room to change its orientation and give the fireplace is rightful prominence in the room. 

 

As it sits, it will always be an awkward entry, whether the chase is square to the ceiling or tapered. 

 

In your space, the fireplace should've been on the outside long wall. 

Negative for many reasons.  I debated for two years about where to put it and even had a thread about it here.  The outside wall had a long list of cons, including the fact that it would be single-use space.  I would lose seating, not be able to effectively put the TV above it and have a decent watching angle (which would mean finding some aesthetic way to add an entire entertainment center that didn't suck in an already small space).  If the fireplace went on the other wall, it would have had to go in the corner, and I would have had a 12' tall steel pipe above the house on the leeward side of the roof.  Non-starter.  For the flow and size of the room, the TV and fireplace have to be incorporated, and this was the clear option.  This fireplace design is actually smaller in volume than the entertainment center it is replacing, and adds a massive design element.

I don't feel as though the entryway will be awkward

D2W said:

That's quite a mix of design aesthetic. I wouldn't do the river rock. Too big, overpowering. Stacked stone would be very nice, but not unusual. I like your idea of copper sheeting. Maybe a design that uses wrought iron as trim? 

I can dig that.  I'm wondering if the copper will be too much.  Too much bling, eye-catching, texas-style, look-at-me.

John Welsh (Moderate Supporter) said:

How about something less symmetrical?  That space to the right of the fireplace is not big enough for furniture but it seems important to use the space where function is critical in a small space.  My other consideration is that TV's are increasing in size at a rapid rate.  By the time you buy your next tv, it is likely that it will be bigger than the mantle provided in the sketches where the mantle is generally as wide as the fireplace.  

How about taking the mantle all the way out to the right side corner?  Under that mantle then provide a wood storage box for a couple of spare pieces at the floor level and then maybe a shelf at the mid level.  

 

Im not finding a good example of non symetrical fire place but maybe these will help...  

My goal is just for more mantle length.  But, if your mantle is already cut then this is all moot.  

I very much hate symmetry except in certain situations.  When I built my patio roof, it had three posts.  The center post is intentionally 3" off center.  It's not enough that your eye says "whoa, that's f'd up," but given how the two sides of the patio have entirely different utilities, it works perfectly.  When I design sets for the theater, they are rarely symmetrical unless the theme of the show dictates that it is a necessity.  Even then, I will sometimes purposely make one element a half inch longer on one side just so I sleep better but no one will notice from the balcony.  I have three levels of design parameters when it comes to symmetry.  1) situations where it must be symmetrical.  For instance, the hearth on this fireplace might end up being 8" x 16"  slate tile.  (actually, it will likely be one piece of slate).  Since 8" wide tile goes into 52" exactly 6.5 times, that is a situation where symmetry is key.  grout line in the center so that the outside cuts on the left and right tile will be exactly the same.  2) situations where it should LOOK symmetrical but an engineered asymmetry is a nice easter egg... like my patio roof.  3) situations where blatant asymmetry is called for like art, landscaping, or window dressings.

This fireplace (for me) falls into the #2 category.  I don't care if its perfectly symmetrical, but I feel that obvious asymmetry will pull it one step too close to an aesthetic that is too modern.

Patio roof:

Ian F (Forum Supporter) said:

A friend of mine put his flat screen above his fireplace as it seemed like an ideal spot for it. It lasted there for a couple of months before he got tired of constantly looking up at the TV from his couch and lounge chairs. 

If the goal is to create a "sitting room" type feel, then I agree with pheller- the fireplace should be an integrated part of an entire wall assembly.  Rather than a fire place with book shelves, more along the lines of book shelves that happens to have a fireplace in it.

edit: Ok... with the entry door right there, I see your options are more limited.  I still think the minimalist shelving contradicts the "warm and cozy" feeling you seem to be aiming for.

My TV was there before.  The ceilings in here are only 82".  With the TV angled down a couple degrees and my head leaning back on the couch it was perfect.  It's not like I have 10' ceilings and I'm looking up.  The bottom of the TV will only be about 48" off the floor.

This is how it used ta was

With the live edge slab and the natural stone hearth you've already got a couple of dominant visual elements in a relatively small space.  I think I'd go with painted drywall for most of it with the wooden shelves adding the rustic warmth that you're after.  If you want more stone then I'd look at a raised stone hearth instead of the slate.

APEowner said:

With the live edge slab and the natural stone hearth you've already got a couple of dominant visual elements in a relatively small space.  I think I'd go with painted drywall for most of it with the wooden shelves adding the rustic warmth that you're after.  If you want more stone then I'd look at a raised stone hearth instead of the slate.

Raised hearth was nixed for two main reasons.  1) I couldn't fit the TV above the mantle because the fireplace would have to be raised the same amount, and 2) the raised hearth would occupy more floor space.  You would have to walk in the door and swoop to the right to avoid the hearth.

It would be easy if I didn't have to comply with UL 1618's hearth rules, and if I hadn't chosen a circulating fireplace.  I can't cover the bottom vent.

In reply to Curtis73 (Forum Supporter) :

Include an exterior shot of the front of the house. 
 

Great design often carries design elements from the exterior through into the interior. 
 

Kind of like how great theatrical design carries ideas from one scene to the next. 

pheller said:

Ick. No, those side shelves just aren't working. At least as triangles. 

 

I understand what you're getting at with a visually huge structure in a small room, but the structure "a straight, boxy chase floor to ceiling" is a well understood and expected architectural design component. 

When I think of a fireplace in a living area, I think of floor to ceiling box, with a big mantel to hang Christmas stockings on, maybe some space to mount a TV above, and maybe some built in shelves on either side. 

This particular example is actually worse to me. 
 

I totally love the actual fireplace surround, but the chase visually cuts right through the structural elements of the timbers.  The timber elements which are supposed to be structural and strong are cut right in half and replaced with weak drywall. Doesn't work for me. 
 

I like the minimized chase in Curtis' drawing. Small space needs that element minimized. However, the TV blows it. Visually, the TV becomes the chase. It looks like something big and imposing hanging into the room like it is gonna come down on someone. 
 

Any chance the TV can move to another spot?

I know there is a closet behind that wall. I also know it is small, so this may not work...

Any chance of elbowing the chimney back into the wall so the chase is on the back side?  That would give the entire flat space above the mantle for the TV.