Top 8 Fireplace Mantle Ideas

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Again, another simple mantle. This look is easily achieved by adding a piece of pine across the top facing portion of the fireplace and laying additional thinner pine on top to create a custom looking mantel. We are working on our mantle this coming weekend so this technique is a possibility.

For a moment I considered leaving all of our stone exposed as shown in this inspiration picture below and adding a wooden beam type of mantle across the top but our vents that are front facing (and totally ugly) didn’t allow us to do that. I also would have needed to find similar stone to add above the fireplace to extend the stone appearance to the ceiling and that was not happening.

I also considered painting the stone white and adding a wooden surround as shown below but I decided against that as I think some brick looks nice when whitewashed but I am not convinced that stone would look good painted.

I love this fireplace mantle and the surrounding bookcases. This is very similar to our first inspirational picture I showed you and will be very close to how our mantle will be constructed. I hope!

I will tell you a little secret. We made significant progress this past weekend on our fireplace and the columns are very similar to the ones shown below and the first inspirational picture I showed you from Better Homes and Gardens. I stole a couple ideas from each and came up with our own unique design.

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Constructing a fireplace mantle is definitely intimidating but I am here to tell you that with a little DIY know how and a few inspirational design pictures, you can achieve your goal. Sometimes I get hung up on the the details and my dad gets hung up on “how to get” there. ha. Nine times out of ten though, we meet in the middle and we find a solution. It’s not always pretty getting there but in the end, it’s always “his” idea :).

UPDATE: YOu can see our completed fireplace makeover here.