Well, it took me a minute, but we finally finished our fireplace. This was a process that took longer than I expected- not because there was anything wrong. I just didn't feel the need to rush. We don't use this fireplace for heat- it's simply for esthetics and honestly, what was here before was outdated and I just wanted a cleaner look. Let me show you the before...
The Before
This picture was taken back in 2021. It took me a while to find this photo ( boy, has my style changed!) because I hardly ever took a photo of this space because I didn't like it. I would usually just crop out that part in the photo. I knew I wanted something and fast forward to 2023, when I finally decided to make that move to subway tile. All of the items used for this project was from Home Depot, andI really didn't cost much to do. I will say, however, that it was very labor intensive so be prepared in th event you want to try tiling on your own.
First thing I did was to find inspiration as to what type of mantel I wanted and what color tile. My vision was for it to be very clean and neutral in color and a big chunky wood mantel. So my husband created a floating wood mantel and I picked out white subway tile by Daltile from the Home Depot . We wanted to create the mantel first so we could see exactly how much tile we needed.
We decided to go with the 4x8 ceramic white glazed subway tile. I used 6 boxes to create this look. You can find them here
For the wood mantel, we used Behr water based wood stain in English Chestnut. You can find it here
Now comes the hard part. Laying the tile. Once we removed the old mantel and tile, we had to redo all of backer board because it got damaged during the removal of the tile. Once we replaced that, we mapped out the tile and slowly got to work. We invested in a wet saw because we knew that it was going to be more than one day and renting one countless times would be the same as owning one. Our favorite brand, Ryobi, was our choice.
Here is the final look of all the tile laid in place. We then waited 48 hrs to grout, and then another 24 hrs to seal it.
And there you go! I'm so pleased as to how it turned out. As always, this job is done with my partner in crime, my boo, my helpmate, my husband Reggie. Big jobs like this require 2 people (or at least in my mind they do!) and we both worked really hard to get this completed by the end of 2023. I hope you enjoy it as much as I do- Drop a line below to tell me what you think.
Until next time,
