1930s House Fire Place, Painting and decorating suggestions - A big list

[ConfusedIsMyMiddleName]

Hello all,
A new mumsnetter here 👋, over the past few years I have seen some wonderful suggesions and ideas on similar topics (and everything else). So I decided to join in myself :) Any good suggestions/ dos and don'ts on this topic are greatly appreciated. And advance apologies, as it's going to be a looong post.🙏

We live in a (late 1920s- early )1930s Semi and we are going to be doing lots and lots of renovation/decoration work.
To start, we got 2 original fire places with glazed brick tiles. This was hidden behind some paneling and I believe the glazed brick tiled Hearths are under the current flooring.
One FP has a Dark Orchre/Brownish Yellow Tiles with a (typical to the period ) arched tile pattern + tall white pine surround with a circular mirror, all surface tiles intact. but may not be the case for the Hearth tiles.
The other FP has Dark Pinkish Red (soft red/cherry pink) tiles and a straight rectangular pattern with curved 'opening' tiles in inner and outer border - so originally there wasn't a surround but just a shelf. Couple of surface tiles slightly damaged and few border tiles are broken and missing from both inner and outer sides.
Both are in a very 'neglected' state at the Moment.
I am hoping I could get them back to a descent state (or bring back to life! rather :)) with some cleaning and perhaps replacig the broken tiles instead of completely getting rid of the old tiles and going in with a cast iron type inserts etc. Because I think I quite warmed in to the old tiles. :) But realised (after searching online for a while) that replacing the same colour tiles are going to be near impossible as I haven't come across them/colours anywhere yet. We are going to cut the floor to see the state of hearth, but if it is not in a good condition, I would need to find some good alternatives to replace it with (asap).

My first Q is: in worst case scenario what are my options? for hearth or completer fire palce? Will I be ruining the hosue in the process trying to fix this?
Anyone has any idea of a place I could source these tiles?

For the pink red fire place with opening bricks missing, I tought perhaps I could use the remaining outer ones to fix the missing inner border, remove all outer border (with a heavy heart) and get a wooden surround to cover up the border.
How should I go about the Hearth if the existing is not in a good state? Should I put different cololur (say creame/white) tiles? A Black slate hearth :( ?

My second Q is on Painting and decorating: House used to have (atleast) the Picture rails. I am thinking of adding them back in and also may be the dado rails. Hallway has the staircase at the front (another typical) so on that side wall height is bit different to the rest. cieling is abot 2.4cm heigh and currently have covings. Adding them through to living room and Master bedroom, second room etc.
what do the majority think about adding dado rails and picture rails both? Or just add one? if so which one?
(Also I really really desperately want to use a different collour for bottom half of the hallway/up the stairs or find a solution for the 'grubby little hands' which is not = ask them to wash the hands as it 'does Not' work at the moment🙈)

thank you so much! x

Dark Yellow FP is exactly like this on front less the hearth and except ours is White surround with circular mirror. And darkened/Blackened/cracked fireback and no grate :)

Anyone? :)

just To say I think that’s a great idea to keep them. Only a while ago and people were junking this style of fireplace but it’s very stylish.

@Peterpiperpickedapeckof thank you :)

Have you got photos of yours?

I'd be minded to keep and live with the imperfections- it's over 90 years old, it's going to have things wrong, but does that mean you should get rid?

@SquishyGloopyBum No, I wasn't thiniking of getting rid. Hence the post
. Fire inserts are all good (ready for a good clean to remove the grout grim) except for 1 o2 tile cracks in Pink-red one. and the missing curved border tiles on the same FP.
But I would need a solution/ideas if the hearths (currently under flooring) are completely lost/unsalvageable as the similar tiles seems to be harder to source. Thanks.

Fireplaces sound lovely - i hope you manage to sort them out. A trip to a large salvage yard might help? Or you could send photos to some of the big ones and ask if they have any tiles etc, that would complete them.

have you looked on pinterest and searched on decor for a 1920/30s house decor? Might give you some ideas. Have any of your neighbours done up their houses recently - you could go and ask for advice?

would love to see more photos of your house!

I’m glad you are keeping these fireplaces. They sound wonderful. As previous poster says I would contact salvage yards for replacement tiles as failing that they may have ideas on how to restore them. Eg is car body filler and enamel paint any good for repairing minor cracks and chips? I would say the style of those fireplaces are Edwardian rather than 1939s when those art deco lower and wider tiled fireplaces come into fashion.
with regard to the dado and picture rails, I would think it likely that the hall and stairs had a dado for all the practical reasons you suggest. It would usually be picture rails only in the other rooms at that time. If you strip the walls back to the plaster at any point you may see the marks where they were. I have a few books which cover this period which you may be able to track down second hand. I’ll pop the details in a separate post.

The Elements of Style - An encyclopaedia of Domestic Architectural Detail by Stephen Calloway covers all periods but has a decent amount on this period

Thank you so much @bilbodog & @notanicepersonapparently for all the inputs snd suggestion 🙏some great tips - would never have thought some of them myself. :)

Unfortunately, the last time I went to the closest salvage place, I didn't get any good (encouraging) inputs ( or may be I didnt know what exactly to ask ) Will see if there is any more around us. And neighbourhood around us (ones I could see) have mostly taken them out and gone with Cast iron inserts.. but got few pics/ideas for picture rail. So that's good.

@notanicepersonapparently wow.. what a lovely book! I got a couple more hits on Google when I search with 'edwardian' like you mentioned. Thanks!!

https://www.cdjackfield.com/
This factory is the sort of place that would have produced the original tiles. I’m attaching a link in case it’s of interest.

Www.c20fireplaces.co.uk might be worth a look.

On question #2, the picture rails, I'd definitely restore the picture rails. They're great. :)

Houses of that period might have had dados, but they would have been old-fashioned, so I'd be cautious there. In my 1931 house I reinstated picture rails in every room, but only did a dado in the dining room.

Thank you again for all the info and links. I'll check these out.

Yes, was thinking of matching picture rails/Dado rails to current architraves (in Ovolo style) as they are more closer to the architraves from top and perhaps dado rails for hallway and stairs to match Skirting (Ogee style)? Also because I didn't see dado rails in ovolo style. Hope this won't look put of place?

We have this coving (as in yhe image attached) in some bedrooms (not original ones, we added them in a sort of a hurry) - they are not ornate. thought they are simple enough. And will match together.

Look out of place* I meant.. :)

Just came to say we have the same style house and fireplace. We kept ours. Painted the surround the same as the skirting, architraves and picture rail. The rest of the room is neutral. The fireplace is a feature.
We love it.

@TrudyProud glad to know :)and sounds beautiful. when you say 'painted same' and 'neutral', did it mean something other than white colour if I may ask?
this is my next sort of step/dilemma.

Our doors (3 over 3 panels) are paint stripped (yellow pine) - nothing much done other than wax at the moment. skirtings are white. again, I sort of love the warmth in the bare doors, DH not agreeying so much as there are some cracks and fillings to be done (as I understand 'normal' for such old doors) :(
and staicase too paint stipped and sanded - original pine staircase. same as doors regarding 'imperfections'.
He thinks we should paint them all back white as easier to cover all niggling bits.

(Like I said at start - my list is long 🙈)

I like stripped doors - we had the same in our edwardian house.

Pointing by Farrow and Ball is my usual choice for ‘white’ in an older house. I would choose an eggshell finish. Clunch is another good choice if you want something with more colour to it. Both are warm whites and should work well with the pine.

All our wood work is white, our walls are almond . We picked this palette because our sofas are emerald green and our accessories (lights, mirrors , alcove cabinet handles etc) are a brushed gold.

Pic 1 is our palette. Pic 2 is our fireplace

30s and Edwardian are different architectural styles and would have different fireplaces. That Elements of Style book is good (I have it) but unfortunately the poster is pointing you to the wrong period. You are better searching for Deco or Moderne (with the ‘e’) or just ‘interwar’.

We live in a 30s house and uncovered one remaining fireplace which had been boxed in and had paint all over pinky colour tiles - sounds lots like yours. We stripped the paint and just left the cracks - they add charm.

Our doors also sound very similar to yours - ours are painted one of the Farrow and Ball warm off whites. We got some reproduction handles from Ebay to replace the awful chrome 80s ones that someone had put on.

All our picture rails are in situ. We painted up to them
in one colour and then the ceiling and above the picture rail in the ceiling colour. Putting them back will return your rooms to the correct proportions and I would definitely have done it if we’d lost them.

30s houses don’t normally have dado rails so it wouldn’t be authentic to put those in.

We also put the stained glass and leaded lights back round the front door, copying the original
one from our neighbours. That remains to this day my very favourite thing I have done in our house. The light shines through it in the evening and it is beautiful. You might want to think about that if you have lost it.

I don’t think I am pointing to the wrong period. I’m going by the photo of the similar fireplace that the OP posted. The ones on the 1920s an 30s page of Elements of Style are different. They are predominantly wider than they are taller.

But the OP specifically said she lived in a 30s house and 30s is not Edwardian.

Edwardian architecture and house design is a well defined and earlier period generally 1901 to 1910 but maybe slightly later (to 1914 ish) the further north you go as fashions spread out from London. Certainly not post WWI. There was then Deco (mainly 20s) and Moderne (late 20s / early 30s).

There are plenty of examples of 30s fireplaces that are taller than they are wide. I own one!

@TrudyProud Wow.. not just it sounded beautiful - it looks BEAUTIFUL too! Thanks for sharing. Our Living room fire surround has the same 'dentil' sort of detail too.
How do you keep it sooo neat/dust free and 'Magazine cover worthy' ? 😁- this itself probably is going to be my next post.. I struggle to keep things in place 🙈