10 DIY Brick Fireplace Plans You Can Make Today (With Pictures)
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Grant Piper
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Brick fireplaces are where coziness and sophistication meet. There are so many things you can do with a brick fireplace to fit nearly any design style. Plus, you don’t typically need a professional to make many of these things happen, either. In fact, it takes little DIY knowledge to give your brick fireplace a facelift.
Whether you’re building a new fireplace or updating the one you already have, it just takes a little bit of know-how and a great plan to make a new statement piece.
We’ve included some of our favorite brick fireplace plans below. These plans come in so many different styles and difficulty levels that you should be able to find something suitable for your fireplace.
The 10 DIY Brick Fireplace Plans
1. Rustic DIY Brick Fireplace with Shiplap by Rain And Pine
| Materials: | Clay bricks, mortar mix, 2” metal support bar |
| Difficulty: | Moderate |
We absolutely adore this rustic brick fireplace with shiplap. It is not like your usual fireplace at all, but it makes a great statement piece in most situations. The primary purpose of this plan is to fix up a fireplace that you already have. Therefore, you’ll likely have to adjust it slightly to fit the needs of your space. It is a pretty straightforward plan so this shouldn’t be terribly difficult.
It goes through everything you need to do, including turning off the gas to your fireplace. It even explains out to adjust fireplace vents and such, should you need to move yours around. Most of the work involves laying bricks, which is pretty simple. However, there are some more complicated steps, like re-routing the gas.
We recommend giving yourself plenty of time to do this plan. It is pretty straightforward, but there is a lot involved.
2. DIY Electric Fireplace by The Full Hearted Home
| Materials: | Hardwood panel, 2x4s, SPAX screws, wood glue, electric insert, standard clay bricks, mortar mix, steel bars, nitrile coated gloves, buckets, joint compound, pine boards, whitewash, an exterior stain of the chosen color |
| Difficulty: | Moderate |
If you’re looking to install a fireplace, it is easiest to use an electric insert. You can find these for only a couple of hundred dollars and then build a brick fireplace around them. That is exactly what this fireplace plan does. Therefore, it is a lot easier and cheaper than other plans out there.
You will need a lot of materials, though. The plan involves building a fireplace from scratch, which simply takes a lot of stuff. You’ll also need a few different tools, though most of these are pretty standard, like a drill. You’ll likely need to buy specialty tools like a brick chisel, but these likely won’t cost you a lot of money.
This plan goes through the whole process, from building the fireplace to staining the mantle. Therefore, it is best for those who are building a fireplace completely from scratch. You can easily change the stain and paint to match your home décor, leaving most of the process the same.
3. Whitewash Bricks with Chalk Paint by Simply Refinished
| Materials: | Painter’s tape, scrub brush, chalk paint, stain-blocking primer |
| Difficulty: | Low |
If you already have a brick fireplace, an easy way to update it is to apply a whitewash. This basically turns all of the bricks white with some slight color variation between them. Therefore, it still looks like a brick fireplace—all of the bricks are just white.
Luckily, this process is very easy and can be performed by those with even very little DIY experience. If you’re looking for a quick and easy way to update your brick fireplace, this is what we recommend.
This plan explains exactly how to whitewash your fireplace, which gives it a farmhouse, earthy vibe. The directions are clear and there is even a video included where they show you the process. Therefore, you can easily complete this project with very few difficulties. Plus, you don’t need many materials or tools, either, making this project extremely cheap compared to others.
4. Rustic Fireplace Mantle by Grey Snail Designs
| Materials: | Various whiteboards, finishing nails, wood screws, wood glue, stain |
| Difficulty: | Low |
Another quick way to update your fireplace is by updating the mantle. In the 2000s, plain, wood mantles were quite popular. In fact, if you look at fireplaces built in the 2000s, you’ll notice that most of them have very similar mantles.
Luckily, changing your mantle up is very easy, and this plan shows you how. You can quickly and easily build your own mantle to change out the one you currently have. You can stain the mantle box to be whatever color you wish, making it easy to fit it in with your current home style. If you wish, you could also adjust the size of the mantle, which makes it easier to fit it into your space.
5. Painting a Brick Fireplace by Sarah Joy Blog
| Materials: | Interior/exterior paint, roller cover, masonry and brick paint |
| Difficulty: | Low |
A fast and easy way to update a fireplace is to paint it. However, painting a fireplace is not like painting a wall. Most paint is not made to work on a fireplace, after all. Luckily, this plan lays out everything you need to know about painting a fireplace—you just need to pick the color!
Despite being a bit more complicated than painting a wall, painting a fireplace is not terribly difficult. You won’t need many tools. However, you will need to purchase brick paint specifically, as other types of paint simply won’t work.
Priming the brick is extremely important, as the plan explains. We do recommend purchasing more primer than you think you need, which will help cover the yellow and red bricks.
6. Thin Brick Fireplace Facelift by Honey Built Home
| Materials: | Thin brick, corner brick, tile adhesive, trowel, mortar, tile cutter, tile spacers, wood dowel |
| Difficulty: | Medium |
One way to transform an existing modern fireplace into a brick fireplace is by using thin brick. Thin brick is a thin version of brick that is made from the same materials as the original brick. You can get thin bricks at almost any home improvement store. The thin brick will be used as a fresh facade over your existing fireplace, allowing you to get the look of natural brick without having to rebuild your entire existing fireplace. This project requires a lot of planning, but if you get the outline correct, the execution should not be too difficult.
If you have ever laid tile or put up a backsplash, you have a good idea of what installing thin brick entails. The use of a wet saw or tile cutter is necessary for the final touches, which can be a problem for someone who has never used such a saw before. Otherwise, most of the bricks will be arranged and adhered with little trouble.
7. Outdoor Brick Fireplace by How To Lou
| Materials: | House bricks, fire bricks, concrete blocks, Muriatic acid, bags of mortar mix, 13×13-inch ceramic flue pipe, angle bar and steel bar, sandcrete and pea gravel |
| Difficulty: | High |
Not all fireplaces have to be inside. Some of the best fireplaces are of the outdoor variety. These plans will help you construct your very own outdoor brick fireplace. This is an advanced project that requires 1,400 bricks, 150 concrete blocks, and dozens of bags of mortar. If you have building experience, the payoff can be huge. This fireplace is incredible and gives you ample space to host roaring fires on an outdoor patio or as a part of an expansive outdoor kitchen space. You can also install it on the edge of a deck or near a pool for an added bit of ambiance and functionality.
Be aware that you will likely need to get all of these materials delivered, and if you get them in one go it is going to cost a decent amount. You can also try and build the fireplace slowly over time with what you can get in your truck, which will spread the cost and effort out over a larger time frame.
8. Fresh Brick Fireplace Makeover by The Wood Grain Cottage
| Materials: | Whitewash paint, finish plywood, 1×4 material, tapcons, finish nailer, saw, drill, paintbrush, rags |
| Difficulty: | Medium |
These plans help you revamp an old brick fireplace by whitewashing the exterior and adding a decorative wood feature. The results are night and day. The old fireplace gets a fresh modern take that can be customized to fit your exact style. This project is not particularly difficult as it uses simple layered wood to create a truly breathtaking design feature. It does not require serious construction or a ton of knowledge to complete in a reasonable amount of time.
There are plenty of ways to tweak these plans to make them yours. You can choose to add a mantel or not. You can also choose a mantel that fits your home better than the one suggested. You can paint the decorative wood front or stain it. The sky’s the limit. If you know what you are doing you can also change the exact design of the wooden front to make it match your design preferences a little better.
9. Brick-By-Brick DIY Fireplace by Fine Home Building
| Materials: | Bricks, level, mortar, trowel, brick cutter, ladder, tape measure, chimney pipe |
| Difficulty: | High |
In many locations, building a fireplace requires a contractor’s license and intensive inspections. That is because doing it wrong can be disastrous. That being said, if you are willing to take a risk or put your skills to the test, you can build a full fireplace brick by brick. Make sure to check your local regulations before starting on this extensive project to make sure you are not going to run afoul of local regulators.
You can build your very own fireplace, but it will take a lot of time and a high degree of knowledge and expertise. These plans will walk you through the build, moving from the ground up. These plans are based on a Rumford fireplace which helps heat radiate outward from the firebox into the room instead of funneling the heat up and out of the building. That makes this fireplace an excellent heating unit.
10. Clean An Existing Brick Fireplace by Simple Practical Beautiful
| Materials: | Scrub brush, rags, Speedy White Hearth Cleaner |
| Difficulty: | Low |
Building or revamping a brick fireplace is a daunting task for many people. Not everyone is equipped or willing to try and build a full fireplace. For those people, there is good news. You can completely clean an old brick fireplace to inject brand new life into the structure. Clean brick can look brand new, especially since brick does not wear over time like other materials. That means that you might not need to demolish, paint, or redo your fireplace. You might just need to give it a good scrubbing. These instructions will walk you through step-by-step how to clean your brick fireplace so that it will look brand new, saving you the need for expensive or difficult makeovers.
Conclusion
There are many easy ways to give a fireplace a facelift. For instance, if you whitewash the brick and then make a new mantel, you’ll basically find yourself with a new fireplace. You can also paint the fireplace a unique color to match the rest of your home or you can apply a German smear for an interesting and professional-looking finish.
If you don’t have a fireplace, building one is probably cheaper than you’d imagine. You can utilize bricks and an electric insert to make a fireplace in nearly any location. Of course, building a working fireplace is much more difficult and likely not suitable for DIY work.
We hope that our plans provided you with the inspiration you need to update your current fireplace or build a completely new one from scratch.
You Might Also Be Interested In:
- 8 DIY Brick Fire Pit Plans You Can Build Today (with Pictures)
- How to Clean a Brick Fireplace in 8 Steps (with Pictures)
- How Much Does it Cost to Install a Gas Fireplace Insert?
- Can You Nail Into Brick?
Featured Image Credit: joseclaudioguima, Pixabay
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