Hi, my suggestion may not be what you want but I had my brick fireplace before we installed the wood floor. I didn't like the look of the wood abutting the brick so my DH got quarter round molding and installed it (even around a slight curve) and I mixed up some paints to the exact color of the bricks and painted it and then varnished over the paint. I painted it before he laid it in. We had a floor may from Lowes here today to measure for a new floor and he asked where we bought the custom trim, he'd never seen such a good match to brick lol. It's an easy thing to do, I used acrylic craft paint.

I just checked the custom built-ins in this house and they are all 11 1/2" deep. I have decades of books and all fit neatly, I wouldn't want them any more shallow if I had a choice (understanding that few homes are perfect :)) But back to the cable box, I wouldn't design something permanent around them, I'd let one extend into the room first before tearing into a wall for depth. I don't know your company, but in the last year I've replaced (or added in one room, hadn't planned originally to be watching TV in that space) three cable boxes...the oldest in my office is a whopping 13" deep, more than 17" wide (and silver which doesn't go with my décor). The other two, all three of them Comcast, only 7x9". And a discreet black.

I guess I'm late to the discussion, morganlp21, Are you still working on this? I would mostly agree with DavidR. Having multiple speakers spread out around the listening area gives the best overall effect. Think of a department store. They'll have hundreds of speakers throughout their space but each playing softly. You can hear the music everywhere but it doesn't drown out anybody's conversations. I also agree that the speakers should all be playing in mono. Stereo relies on the listener being in a "sweet spot." That's impossible over a large area. Stereo is pointless and annoying under these conditions. Where I don't agree is the world's obsession with wireless speakers. (Not dissing DavidR here, his is a valid consideration, it's just that in every discussion, everywhere, about speaker placement these days, wireless is the first "solution" everybody jumps to.) Wireless doesn't mean electricity-less. You either have to plug them in to power them, plug them in to recharge them, or change batteries all the time. Plugging in defeats the whole point of wireless. Everybody I've seen go the wireless route ends up schlepping the speakers out every time the want to hear music and schlepping them back inside afterwards. And they all still have the problem of single point sound being too loud for the people nearby and inaudible for people across the yard. None has opted to continually schlepp multiple speakers outside. Contrast that with a wired system where you just have to flick a switch or two. Guess which will get used the most ? Wiring is pretty easy. Low-voltage landscape lighting wire is made for direct ground burial and works perfectly for consumer speaker installation. (High power commercial PA is a different animal.) If you can install Malibu Lights, you can install a landscape speaker. Conduit isn't required but you want to avoid putting a shovel through it while gardening. So some kind of protective cover or sleeving may be useful in some areas. I'm a big proponent of individual wire runs and individual level controls for each speaker (with one master control for the whole system). There's added cost in the front end, more electronics, but I feel the added flexibility of setting sound levels for each zone is worth it. It's nice to be able to dial up the volume close to the pool where music is competing with pumps and waterfalls and swimmers splashing and have it lower on a patio where people are conversing.

I need help with what to add to my mantle that will go with my bull! I have a few things to the left but I don’t care for it. Any suggestions?