Hi all,

We’ve just bought our first house and we absolutely love it, we do however hate the fireplace and brick work (see pic below).

We do want a fireplace, but something more modern and much slimmer.

What would we need to do to remove the fireplace? Can we just rip the brickwork down?

Any ideas or advice would be greatly appreciated.

At a guess, yes, it looks cosmetic. How old is the house? If its 1970s onwards its unlikely to be structural.

At a guess I’d say it’s only one brick deep but tied in to the house wall. Get herself a plugging chisel, remove a brick and see how far it goes back..

It’s a 1975 build.

We just want a clear wall with a slim fireplace to gain some, although little, space back.

think i would probably just plaster board over it and skim it as the space saving would be negligible.

think i would probably just plaster board over it and skim it as the space saving would be negligible.

This.

Agree with the plaster over it but you don’t need plasterboard.
Just plaster straight over.
Knock a hole in the bottom and put in a wood burner or even a nice gas stove.
Good luck.

I once had a similar brick chimney breast and went for the simple option – a large tin of white emulsion, very pleased with the finished look.

Space wise I meant removing the floor part and taking it back to a flat wall.

Thanks all for the suggestions. Plenty to think about.

I’d go whitewash, and a nice woodburner. 😀

So those saying fit a wood burner or fire…..you realise what the regs are for hearth sizes beyond the fire right ? Hearth to regs would be about a foot from his sofa ……ok i exagerate but he would lose loads of space in that room

The settee in that picture isn’t ours. It’s huge.

We just want something simple. Probably electric.

Skim with plaster and fit an inset gas fire.

Ah, so you want to remove the hearth bit? Might be hard to get matching flooring to fill the gap, so insider new flooring.

We are wanting carpet down anyway so flooring not an issue.

<Watches thread with interest as planning something similar>
We’ve just exchanged on a 1947 brick house with a blocked up fireplace in the living/dining room. Need to remove the plasterboard from the front but would like to fit a woodburner.
I’ll be taking notes from the wisdom of the STW massive, and good luck OP!

Brickwork looks cosmetic to me and I’d be knocking it off, but make sure it’s not holding something up first!
I’m more intrigued by why the wall on the right hand side sticks out into the room?

I’m surprised no-one’s asked what is at the other side of the wall.

It doesn’t. The wall to the right was added by the previous owner. It used to be an archway

Turns out the flue is useless!!! The fire has been condemned and capped!

What next?!????

Any info on the best course of action? Rip out and fit an electric fire?

How come? can a liner be fitted?

Might be something to do with existing liner. If you want to get rid of the hearth you could have look at either flueless wall mounted gas fires or an electric version. They look like plasma tellies.

The gas certificate man condemned it today. We aren’t moved in yet. The vendor has offered £300 off the price but I have no idea how much a flue would cost fix.

We are thinking of just ripping out the gas fire and the horrible brick and fitting an electric fire.

Yes but why?

Why bother with an electic fire at all….look shite and cost a fortune to run.

The estate agent said it was due to the rough lining.

So we should replace with another gas fire?

I removed a similar brick fireplace out of my house last summer. They came out quite easy. The wall was then boarded and plastered and ran a wire behind the board ready to receive an electric fire. Fire looks good for the price and is only used as a feature with the lights on. (Think i’m the only person on the forum that doesn’t have a wood burner).

I had the same gas fire condemned. I was told it was leaking a wee bit, but suspect it was the Taste that was more offensive.

There are some good modern flue less gas fires that just mount on the wall. B&Q do a smug one for about £300

We want to take the brick away so maybe it’s a good time to do it now.

I didn’t realise an electric fire would cost so much more.

Guess we better start getting some quotes. That’s my new to out of the window.

Need to see pics or explain it better. Is it the chimney or a liner that is “rough” can a liner be drooped down?

Yeah, hopefully we will find out more tomorrow. We are going down to measure up for furniture so will ask the agent.

We have to do something as there is no radiator in the room. The fire is the only source of heat.

Bricks out , fire out

Radiator in.

Correcting previous owners cock ups.

A room should always have a radiator in if ch is fitted to the house. That said id gladly just have rads in the bedrooms for 5 am heat to make it easy to get out of bed :)…. Not sure buyers will understand that

We will definitely have a radiator put in at some point.

Anyone have any idea how much it would cost to add a radiator?

We are thinking of having a new boiler so would all the radiators in the house need replacing?

I really appreciate all the help and advice.

You can probably tell we are first time buyers.

Strictly speaking . No no need to replace all.

Dont be surprised if you do get advised to though.

They aint always trying it on. Many folks for some reason massively underspec radiators to room size or stick them in rediculous places- when i moved in i had undersized boiler / undersized rads all in a 6ft radius . What the tit saved on copper pipe he probably spent on oil trying to keep place warm.

I swapped them out when i didthe boiler and it was stupidly better at heat distribution

Adding a radiator. Depends on plumber but id reckon on 60 quid for a double panel rad 20 quid for valves- trv and then some pipe to the heating circuit. – depends on system and distance plastic pipe and push fittings – cheap copper , bit pricier . Can mix systems bu depends on your plumber and his preferance

Brilliant Trail_rat thank you very much for the advice.

Sometimes I wonder how I’d get by without the knowledge base that is STW 🙂