LIVING ROOM MAKEOVER - THE FIREPLACE
We've been in our house for almost a year and a half. In that time we have had so many ideas for what to do with our living room...too many really! So back in January I was inspired and taped out my latest idea for the mantle.
The idea was for something more contemporary than traditional. No fancy build outs or trim, just clean lines. I had envisioned staining it dark to match the railings and then installing some floating shelves on either side. My husband agreed with the design but wanted built in shelves not floating shelves and so we began construction that weekend.
Step One: Move the furniture and turn on Mickey Mouse (obviously, haha!)
Step Two: First we removed the baseboard from the wall. Then we installed 3 boards where we wanted the mantel and secured them to the wall. This is where we were able to attach the side boards (step three)
Step Three: The tv had to be moved for the stage (sorry kids!). We used cabinet grade maple for this project (our stair rail is in maple and were trying to achieve the same finished look). I wanted the mantle to be 8" wide and deep. We started by attaching the outside pieces, nailing them to the board we installed in step two. Next we installed the inside pieces. We worked on the sides before installing the top pieces.
Step Four: Finally we added the front pieces. Overall this project was completed in under a day and used 2 sheets of wood. We were almost able to get it all from 1 sheet of wood, but we were just short on the last piece!! In hindsight I may have modified my design slightly to make it work with 1 sheet of wood.
Over the next few days we slowly worked at filling the nail holes and sanding. I picked up a few brochures with wood stains in an attempt to match up the stair rail, but had no luck finding a match. My next thought was to pick up a few colours that were close and try using them on a few wood scraps to compare. My husband was trying to convince me to paint it white instead. So I needed some time to decide what to do (and by time I mean a month - haha). We gave ourselves a deadline of being finished before my mom arrived for her visit and trust me we put off the remaining to do list until days/hours before her plane arrived!!
I'll post the rest the details of the bookshelves tomorrow. We are going to attempt to do the tile ourselves this time. It's a project we have always hired out, but since this is such a small job, it's not too enticing for a tiler to come out for. We selected an in stock mosaic tile from Home Depot and are going to use a grey grout but we are still debating which way the tile should go. I vote for the more traditional wider layout and my husband votes for the less traditional taller looking layout. So after we decide what to do with that I think we'll be doing our first ever tile install!
My vote (wider)
My husband's vote (taller)
