Woodburner or alternatives for living room, any advice?

[SouthOfFrance]

We are about to re-do our fireplace in the living room. Currently it's a 1980s big gas fire, very dated.

When we moved in about 10 years ago we always intended to get a woodburner, however recently have heard more about how bad these can be to the environment and health. I'm now wondering if changing it to a new gas fire would be cheaper and healthier.

Does anyone have any links to any nice gas fires as all the ones I've seen (admittedly, only in B&Q!) look pretty cheap & fake. There must be some nicer ones out there.

Or should we stick to the idea of a woodburner or multifuel? I'm worried these might soon become dated themselves due to the health reasons etc? Any other options I've not considered?

We have a Broseley Hereford gas stove , it’s the same actual outer as their wood burner but just fitted with fake logs and gas , it looks really good IMO .

Thank you Flora, just had a Google, that one does look nice & I like the traditional design. How realistic do the logs look in real life?

Up close not particularly if I’m honest but as a feature in the room it looks great .

Lots of discussion in this thread.

We’re thinking about one of these

chesneys.co.uk/product/stoves/gas-stoves/salisbury-gas-stove

To replace a wood burner installed by the previous owners and which we don’t use precisely because of the interior pollution. If anyone has one would be interested in feedback.

If you live anywhere built-up please don't get a woodburner. I'm constantly having to breathe in my neighbour's smoke when the wind blows in a certain direction. It's smelly and unhealthy as I have bad asthma and it makes me cough even inside my home.

Having same debate in our house. The Dimplex optimyst is meant to be great, for an electric fake woodburner look. But I'm not sure how much heat it would throw out in to a large room. I'm not keen on a gas appliances for various reasons. Bio ethanol gets mixed reviews. It's a tricky decision.

Thanks for that other thread link John, lots of ideas there.

The Chesneys one looks good but is £££, it's a shame there aren't more photos of it on their website isn't it.
Will check out the Dimplex one too, I think I've seen that mentioned a few times now.

Such a dilema, we don't have a huge room, guess average sized for a living room, but it's quite a cold house so do need the heat. Just want something that doesn't look too fake really. Although not super built up around here like a city centre there are other houses close by, I bet loads of them have log burners though.

I don't want to annoy the neighbours or cause more pollution than we need to, I guess selfishly I'm more concerned about the health of the people in our house though. Also the reality of having to order logs and clean the fire would wear thin quite soon for me too I think!

Beecham you are right, it's such a tricky decision!

Ours is a gas fire with fake logs that looks real, we love it.

Sorry fake coal not logs!

Someone on another thread mentioned an everhot electric stove - I think they are really cute! And you can cook a jacket potato in it!!

everhot.co.uk/Everhot-Electric-Stove.aspx