Restoring a craftsman/arts and crafts tile fireplace
adlu10
8 years ago
Hi! My wife and I are remodeling a house built in 1920 and one of our projects is restoring the arts and crafts tile fireplace.
It's been painted over many, many times and we're using a product called Multi-Strip to remove the paint. The picture above shows the thickest layers removed, with one last red layer.
Under the paint, the surface of the tile is rough and beige colored, as seen in the lower right part of the picture below (the goop in the lower left corner is Multi-Strip):
We'd like to restore the tile to a neutral color scheme, like this Houzz Photo:
Custom cherry library, wallpaper, leaded glass cabinet doors, rolling ladder · More Info
I'd really appreciate any advice on the process for restoring the surface. Should we prime and paint, and if so, what products would you recommend? Thanks very much!!
-Adrian
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Comments (6)
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Comments (6)We have a 1907 arts and crafts style house and have recently redone a 70's bathroom. Throughout the house are dark beams and moldings, etc. In the bathroom we put white subway tile (cream grout) in the bath/shower area and white octagonal tile (slate gray grout) on the floor. We got craftsman style moldings to put around the ceiling area and a narrow shelf-type molding around the top of the wainscotting. (The 'wainscotting' was actually previously stained cedar on the walls and ceiling.) I put primer over the stained cedar and painted the ceiling and all woodwork with Benjamin Moore 'white chocolate.' The walls are now painted Benj.M. 'powell buff.' We kept the built-in cabinetry and a large mirror that slides open to store towels and toiletries. I also did as much of the work as I could (which was mostly a little wall work and a lot of painting.) We purchased a new toilet, tub, sink and fixtures, a large and small light fixture, wood moldings, supplies, paint and the cost of two guys working for a few days to install tub, raise counter height several inches and put on a new countertop and install the tile. The total cost for everything was about $10,000. I love the new (old) look. If I could have anything different I would have liked either a clawfoot tub or pedestal sink or both. But what we did actually looks very nice and we are very pleased....See MoreRug and decor questions, specifically Arts and Crafts style
Comments (21)I love arts & crafts and mission styles too so I was drawn right into this post. Since you have a budget and say you won't (ever?) have more money to put into the decor I think you need to sit down and think about how to spend the money. Which things do you expect to last "forever" and which can you see replacing down the road? Put the bulk of your money into the forever stuff. I think as long as you keep things simple you can mix art & crafts/mission with other styles with great success. Puffy recliners are no good though so get rid of that thing! Just kidding. Sort of ;-) We'd all like to a houseful of Stickley and Van Erp but most of us can't afford that. There are "no name" antique mission furnishings out there at reasonable prices (because they are no name) that are solidly built. Someone like my father, who hated mission furniture, would use them as work benches or whatever. Now they need refinishing but they're still good pieces. Keep your eyes open for those diamonds in the rough....See MoreArt & Crafts Kitchen Re-do
Comments (23)I would say the cabinets in the scullery are original and doubt there was an icebox. Also, don't think the window is original and no there is no door. It is quite cramped in there. But over the years something was done to that area as you can see the 1960s molding they put around the window and the opening. Well you guys have given me something to think about for sure. I was going to gut the left side so that I could put 30" cabinets on the right with a dishwasher, leaving the sink and the top cabinets on the right. In doing so we would be ruining the scullery by making it bigger making it part of the new kitchen??? Gosh I hate to ruin it. Regardless the bottom cabinets need to be replaced; they stink and are kinda soft they could be gumwood. The uppers appear to be some other kind of wood. Have a serious small budget however since we don't live in Buffalo - this is a second home. But there's no hurry. I will see if the Amish people can build some simple 24" cabinets to replace the bottoms. Maybe there's a way to get 24" cabinets at a reasonable cost? BTW the bigger room adjacent where we are going to put the appliances has so many window and door openings that it quite challenging to get many cabinets. A few around the stove and an island is about all we can do with it. I will post more pics and dimensions once we get back up there. Luckily for us, only the kitchen and bathroom require major work, the other rooms have been lived in quite lightly over the years. Amazing....See MoreBlack shades in Craftsman/Arts&Crafts home
Comments (19)Debra - You have a great house! Thank you for posting about the Roycroft Inn. I have put it on my must go visit list! I have black roller shades for my house but they are not installed yet. I ordered Reminisent Black - room darkening from Blinds . com And I am ashamed to say they are still in the box. All 24 shades. We decided on roller shades after visiting the Biltmore last fall. They have dark green shades all over that house and we loved them but green is not part of my deco and black is, so... I did get those paper accordion shades from a Lowes clearance pile when we first moved in and the box had one black and two white shades. I bought a few boxes to try out the color in my LR and decided black was it. Go see if your local Lowes has any and for a couple bucks you could try the black color in a window. For your house I just might go with the green because you have so much green already. Also IDK but I don't think greens have to match. They just have to coexist well, like they do in nature. And that is an arts & crafts thing right? The green that Blinds had is dark dark, almost a black. You can get samples. I just went with the least expensive vinyl ones for room darkening and the quality seems decent but again we have not installed yet. I still have the black accordion ones up in the LR if you want to see a picture....See More
adlu10
8 years agoThanks for your comments! We stripped the paint off in December, installed the gas insert, then left on vacation. Now that we're settled into the new year I'm thinking about what to do next:
- I will strip the paint off the mantel shelf and stain the wood. Any suggestions on what color I should stain it?
- I will replace the hearth tiles with something - maybe some tiles, or stone, or maybe a bunch of loose pebbles or small stones. Any advice?
- Any advice on whether or how to refinish the surface of the fireplace tiles would be appreciated. Please see pics below.
-Adrian
cpartist
8 years ago
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