Replacing 1920s / 1930s tiles with similar

[cantkeepawayforever]

A little while ago, I posted on here about putting a woodburner in a recently-uncovered 1920s / 1930s fireplace.

It looks like the best way to go is in fact to take out the fireplace and enlarge the opening, but perhaps use similar tiles to surround the new opening.

The only thing is that the current tiles are - to the nearest cm - 15 cm x 5 cm, which doesn't seem to be a normal size for anything except borders. They have really good proportions for the task.

Can you knowledgeable people suggest any possible suppliers? Think the original fireplace was made as a 'kit' with curved tiles round the opening and identical tiles forming the hearth.

Like this but a nicer colour - a sort of bluey grey:

Found my ruler marked in inches. The current flat tiles are exactly 6" x 2".

Have you had a look at 20th Century Fireplaces based in Stockport? Their website is pretty good.

Thanks! Once I started searching in inches, a couple of websites popped up that I hadn't seen before.

The current tiles are quite loose, so it may be possible to salvage some or all - we shall see.

They do inserts for old fireplaces too - are you not tempted to keep the fireplace as it is?

Basically, we have two choices:

• Leave it as it is, perhaps adding a fire basket (it was hidden behind boarding) BUT that leaves a draughty chimney and a fire which won't produce much heat

OR

• Install a wood burner, which would mean breaking out a wider opening (the opening is quite small, shallow and an odd shape) which would mean losing the original feature BUT would block up the draughty chimney AND produce some genuine heat quite efficiently.

A good fitter will be able to salvage the tiles so you can reuse. Not sure if there’ll be enough though? It would be nice to use the original tiles too

I think it would be a real shame to take that fireplace out. The tiling is lovely.

If you really want a woodturner, you could consider something like this which would allow you to leave the fireplace intact. If you look on the case studies tab, there are some pictures of it installed.

salamanderstoves.com/the-hobbit-stove/

I think that's a lovely fireplace. It'd be a travesty to rip that out, what a lovely feature!

I agree, please consider leaving it where it is. Houses from the 1930s/1920s don't suit woodturning stoves. Their for modern houses/cottages/rooms without formal fireplaces.

Thanks! I do really appreciate your points. We already have a log burner in a much larger grander fireplace in another room, which is great - the house in general is chilly and quite hard to heat, so we do tend to warm it room by room if we can. Ideally our solution would be both decorative AND contribute significantly to the overall warmth of the room!

I'm looking into the Hobbit ...local stockist no longer seems to exist, which is a bit of a pain!

(And just to be clear, that's not a photo of our fireplace. Our is a similar style, but it has been behind boarding for about the last 3 years, has no fire basket and isn't anything like as shiny! The tiles are a kind of cloudy blue / grey. We pulled off the boarding expecting a rough hole, and found the fireplace just sitting there)

30 years, not 3!

Right, update.

• The Hobbit won't work because we don't have enough clearance on either side to the wooden fireplace surround (despite being only 30 cm wide itself, it needs 40 cm clearance on each side to combustible materials)

• We're currently looking at inset stoves. Some of these have shaped backs so they actually fit into the existing fireplace BUT it will mean a rectangular 'front' on the arched fireplace. Either fitted flush or slightly protruding (the latter will give more heat)

• Other option remains knocking out a rectangular hole and re-lining with tiles.

• Not going for an open fire, however authentic. Just not enough heat and too much draught.