Wednesday, February 10, 2016

plain jane firebox

We're remarkably lucky that many of our beautiful firebacks and inserts have survived the years intact, especially given the abuse that so much of the house has gone through.  We have a few that are plain brick though, and it's unclear if they have missing elements, or were plain to begin with.  One of these plain ones is in the nursery.  There had been significant water infiltration from the degraded chimneys, and this led to the flaking paint and efflorescence in the firebox.



The brown is masonite covering the flue,
I wasn't brave enough to take it off...
It was a surprisingly straightforward task (albeit filthy) to clean up the mess of paint, brick and mortar dust, and soot (so much soot in this house, every task, soot).  Everything got a thorough scrub with a nylon brush, and a good vacuum.  Then a few coats of rustoleum high heat black paint.  The paint went on thin, and seemed to penetrate and seal the questionable sections quite well.  This was always a gas burning fireplace, and we reran a gas line to the area (although not back into the firebox) when we ran the gas line to the dryer.  Someday we hope to install a modern gas insert, and the paint should hold up just fine to occasional use.


You may be wondering what the writing on the brick is...  


It says Reese Hammond and Co. Bolivar PA.  While the company was incorporated in 1898, initially causing me great confusion, it existed with Reese and Hammond as partners in the 1870's.

a Reese and Hammond firebrick, not mine...
the Reese Hammond brickworks
 The room is creeping towards completion, with paint touchups, quarter round and such waiting to get done, as well as stove black on the rusty iron surround (unless someone has a more exciting suggestion).  The tile is a long term project. I keep hoping to find matching tiles, and while I've seen the flower border before, I've never seen it in the odd olive color.  Maybe at some point I'll get desperate enough to integrate another pattern, but it's only been 5 years, I have more patience than that left in me...

8 comments:

  1. I'm not seeing what the problem is with the tile? Is that outside of a photo area?

    Ebay had an amazing amount of old tile, the last I looked, which was a few years ago. A saved search with email notification might be useful.

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    1. Hiding just out of frame the rest of the tiles are missing from when a partition wall was built over them, and many besides those are badly worn and smashed. Ebay is great for tile, there is just so much to sift through, with no guarantee that sellers will use appropriate search terms! Still, we check regularly...

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  2. Patience is a necessary skill when dealing with such a renovation as comprehensive as yours. We develop tunnel vision, where we only see the parts we want to and ignore the rest. Seeing the 'big picture' is too overwhelming most times.

    I don't see a tile problem either.

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    1. When my tunnel vision evaporates I end up in bed for the day completely overwhelmed. Tunnel vision is the only thing that makes this project possible, at least until rooms are complete enough for punch lists lol...

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  3. I suffer profoundly from tunnel vision with my big old house.

    Thank God.

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  4. That fireplace does not look "plain jane" to me. It's stunning. :D

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    1. Really it's just the inside bit that's boring, we're lucky that we have a few firebacks in other fireplaces that have survived which are absolutely stunning!

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