Now that the hearth is done, we still have to address the missing brick in the fireplace.
We had a couple of people come and look at what could be done and got two very different quotes. The first guy, unsure he could even do it, wanted a lot of money. The second guy was brilliant. He knew exactly how to fix it and wanted a fair price for the work. Great.
The second guy sent Bill to work on our fireplace. He brought a few bricks and after sanding them down, saw that they were an exact match to our bricks. Some of them were even from the same brick manufacturer and likely came from the same batch – over 100 years ago.
Bill started by removing the damper and all of the loose and damaged bricks.
He then worked to replace the brick and insert a lintel. Since the fireplace was arch-less, there needed to be some support to keep the brick in place.
It took Bill a good 8 hours to finish the job, and we were amazed at how great it looked.
The mortar is still drying and the colour doesn’t quite match yet. I’m hoping that over the next month or so (which is how long it takes to fully cure), it will lighten up a bit…
Before I show you the final, let’s remember what the fireplace originally looked like, shall we?
And now here’s what it looks like!
We still have some sanding to do on the brick, but we’ll wait until the mortar is completely dry.
Now all we need is that wood stove…