Fireplaces have long been used as a source of heat in a person’s home. Fireplaces were widespread in Western Europe, whence the fashion for them came to Russia in the 18th century. But a fireplace is not only a source of heat in the house, but also an elegant element of decorative decoration, giving them a special cosiness, a luxury item and relaxation. The charm of a living fire that you never get tired of looking at creates an incomparable indoor microclimate. Thanks to such properties of fireplaces, decorative fireplaces, which are not the main source of heat, but act as an element of the decor of the room, are becoming increasingly common in urban apartments with central heating.
Such fireplaces can be purchased ready-made. They are presented in a wide variety in a modern trading network. Moreover, you can buy a purely interior fireplace, which serves only to decorate the room, a fireplace with simulated fire and a fireplace with a partial heating function, for example, based on an electric heater.
DIY fireplaces
The prices of fireplaces on the market are in a very wide range of values - from several thousand to several hundred thousand rubles. Moreover, the lion's share of the cost of such products falls on their decoration. Therefore, for many, the question of how to make a decorative fireplace in your own apartment with your own hands is relevant.
As practice shows, this task is by no means as complicated as it might seem at first glance. After all, we are talking specifically about the decor element, and not the construction of a fully-functional structure for heating the premises, which requires the fulfillment of fire safety conditions, the presence of a chimney, etc.
In this article we will look at how to make a decorative fireplace with your own hands. The step-by-step instructions given in the article will help you as soon as possible, without wasting your precious time on unnecessary actions, to complete this work and realize your ideas on improving the interior of your apartment.
Project selection
In this step, two problems must be solved. The first (depending on the purpose of installing the fireplace) is what materials to use in the manufacture. The second is where to place the fireplace and how to fit it into the interior of the room.
About the materials. If the fireplace is purely decorative, then in its manufacture you can use any materials that are available to you - from polystyrene, wood and polystyrene to metal, ceramics and natural stone. If you plan to install heating appliances in the fireplace, then the materials for making the fireplace must be non-combustible - brick, metal, stone, and for decoration you can use ceramic tiles, tiles, natural stone, marble, metal. As an example, consider how to make a decorative fireplace in your apartment with your own hands. Take an interior type fireplace.
Where to place a fireplace?
It can be placed anywhere in the rooms of your home or in the kitchen. The main task of such a fireplace is to decorate the interior, make the home more attractive and comfortable, to improve the place for rest. Therefore, it must be positioned accordingly. You can make a corner decorative fireplace with your own hands. In many cases, this is appropriate, since this option takes up less space in the room. But many people prefer to make a fireplace in the wall or near it. This allows you to have a more spacious seating area, in which the fireplace usually occupies a central place.
The next stage is the construction of drawings of the fireplace, and what is desirable - a miniature copy of it in order to introduce yourself and your other household members how it will look in the interior of your home. This will help you better navigate the size of the fireplace and fit it into an existing or planned apartment interior. But it is worth remembering that since you decided to make a decorative fireplace with your own hands, the choice of the option of its manufacture (as well as decoration) remains entirely with you. It should be based primarily on your desires, ideas about beauty and convenience, on the availability of available interior details, so that the fireplace harmonizes with them. Not the least role is played by the amount of funds that you can and wish to spend on decorating the fireplace.
Cardboard fireplace
Perhaps the most economical option on how to build a decorative fireplace with your own hands is presented in several figures above. Imitation of a fireplace is a structure of two, square section of the racks of ordinary, but rather strong cardboard, base and mantelpiece made of solid wood or multilayer plywood. Choose the size of the fireplace and its details yourself, based on your preferences and harmonious combination with other details of your interior. Racks are glued and painted under brickwork. You can paste the racks with wallpaper with a brickwork pattern. The racks are fixed to the base and mantelpiece with glue and metal corner elements using self-tapping screws in such a place that these fasteners are not visible in the finished product. Also, screws and corners attach the finished product to the wall. Black paper with a picture of fire is glued inside a decorative fireplace. On the podium in front of the fire pattern, several firewood are laid out. The decorative fireplace is ready!
Drywall Fireplace
Another way is to use drywall. It is also easy to operate, but allows you to build a product of almost any shape and with a variety of finishes. At the same time, in comparison with the already considered, it turns out a much more durable decorative fireplace with their own hands. Step-by-step instructions include the following steps:
1. Mounting the frame.
2. Sheathing with drywall.
3. Finishing.
Frame mounting
The frame of the product is made of wooden blocks or, more practical, of special profiles - guides PN or rack PS, designed to work with drywall.
Profiles are cut to size in accordance with the designed sketch of the fireplace. First, vertical PS profiles are attached to the wall at the fireplace installation site, which are connected at the top and bottom with PN profiles using self-tapping screws. Then, at the junction of the profiles (perpendicular to the wall), sections of the PN profile are fixed in accordance with the size of the fireplace depth. To the ends of the latter, a pre-prepared frame from profiles is attached, similar to the one that is already attached to the wall. It turned out the skeleton of the future fireplace. Below, the fireplace base frame is made in a similar way, and inside are the internal partitions, which model the external opening of the fireplace insert with the configuration in accordance with your plan. The lines of this hole can be not only straight, but also curved (for example, its upper side). This is acceptable, since the gypsum plasterboard during installation allows bending, if it is slightly wet before attaching to the frame.
Warnings
Carefully monitor the manufacture of the frame for a clear correspondence of horizontal and vertical lines in level. It is also necessary to control the strict correspondence of the dimensions of the structure, since the final form of the product depends on this. In the manufacture of the frame, its dimensions must be selected taking into account the thickness of the drywall sheets and finishing materials that will be used in the next stages of work. Qualitatively make a decorative fireplace with your own hands is possible only with the exact performance of work in the first stage.
Drywall
Since you firmly decided to make a decorative fireplace with your own hands, the second step is to cut a plasterboard sheet according to the size of the frame parts. In this case, the parts covering the side and inner parts of the frame are first cut and fastened with screws to the frame. Sheet cutting is performed on a metal ruler with a sharp knife for wallpaper. Then, the parts covering the front part of the fireplace are cut, taking into account the already installed side and internal details of the skin. These parts are also fastened with screws to the frame. If the design of the fireplace is simple and it is not intended to use heavy materials for decoration, then they are sheathed in one layer of drywall. Otherwise, two-layer cladding is used. Cutting out the details of the second layer is carried out after the implementation of the first layer, taking into account its thickness.
The base of the fireplace is best made from a more durable material (bricks, stone, etc.) in order to avoid possible damage.
The lining details are carefully primed, dried and plastered. Usually, re-performing these operations is required to achieve perfect surface quality. After that, the surface of the product is sanded with sandpaper.
Separately produce a mantelpiece of the necessary configuration. To do this, use an array of wood, chipboard, a finished countertop made of wood or other material. The surface of the shelf is also prepared for decoration in accordance with the material from which it is made.
Finish
As noted above, the decoration of a decorative fireplace can be done in thousands of different options, it all depends on your capabilities, desires and preferences. A simple, not very expensive and advantageous in appearance, seems to be the option of finishing with polyurethane parts, which are currently available in a wide variety on the market. This material is durable, easy to assemble, looks great in the finished product. You can venerate the fireplace with ceramic tiles, tiles made of natural stone, etc.
In any case, the material of the outer cladding (and what to fix) is selected in accordance with your plan.
Thus, the article describes step by step how to make decorative fireplaces with your own hands.