Now that you have the close up pix

step back and get a photo of the whole room, for context.

A marble look tile or Penny rounds do not work with the wall. Go for a more solid gray looking tile; not a a varied tile, matte finish. You might check 16x24 and 24x24 for size options.

@skippack do you mean the penny or marble tile for the floor will be too busy with the brick of the fireplace? This is for the hearth

Yes, the styles do not mesh well; pick something that works back to the bricks.

so the brick is stayiing as is as well as the mantel? The brick looks dingy. either repaint it or consider covering it. Ditto that gray wood beam. wrong color and wrong size

Paint the brick a brighter white, get a longer mantel stained in a dark walnut. you could choose to do a piece of white quartz or marble or some remnant.

Since you've had this for many years, how about taking the advice and doing something different?

or, paint the whole thing black and do a basalt tile.

you could get a stone mosaic (any color or material you like) and inset it as the hearth. this is a black marble, but you could do a white marble if you like.

look for a 24X24 or 30X30 basalt tile. try and get a honed, dark black tile. you can cut these to fit the the depth, and you may have one joint line in the middle. grout w/black grout.

You could also go to a stone place and look for a small remnant of black granite. you don't need much.

if you use a tile, get the larger format size.

Tilebar has a ton of those large ones in porcelain. they ahve a few that look like a black metallic.

If I had that fireplace I'd do a black stone surround like this one, a longer mantel and cover the brick above w/something like this. (or if you like more modern, tile the whole thing)

Photoshopped this one

onto yours

way better. Get the basalt tile and cut it to go around the bottom portion like pictured.

here's another w/the same black surround like you have but they covered the brick and tile a tile hearth. yours is flat, but you could still do some type of tile or a remnant piece.

walnut stained mantel)

black slate. (or a porcelain that looks like slate)

you could also choose a smaller, patterned 4x4 or 8x8 tile for the hearth if you like the white brick

https://www.houzz.com/discussions/5830184/please-help-me-choose-living-room-furniture-mantel-accents

we have been here before. The pictures here will help more @Beth H. :

@RL Relocation I actually was going to go pull those pictures! Ha! The rug is different, new furniture too

Beth H the brick is newly painted. The color may seem dingy because of the lighting in the picture. But it is newly painted. The mantle actually was built a year ago to specs provided by someone here that said the mantle should be a certain distance past the firebox and only that distance. We cannot remove the brick. It is what is holding the firebox. Not to mention, the budget isn’t there to do that since we are working with a limited budget from what we were provided with from our insurance settlement from Hurricane Ida.

I will take pictures later to show the full scale with better lighting later but I don’t want to redo the whole fireplace, just the hearth

The brick literally cannot be removed. The whole house is brick and that is part of the house exterior.

you don't have to remove the brick. you can tile on top of it, or fir it out, cement board, then tile.

not difficult to do.

I gave you examples of how to cover the brick w/ MDF trim paneling too.

none of these require the removal of the brick and are pretty cheap to do.

How about a lime slurry?

https://notinggrace.com/how-to-lime-slurry-a-brick-fireplace/

I don't know who gave you the info on the mantel, but it's incorrect. you can see all of the pictures I posted w/the mantel going side to side.

Sorry, but this mantel is too short for the proportion of your fireplace. It would look better if it spanned side to side, and was a darker stain.

You say this brick was just painted? why are dark spots still showing through?

This is a similar FP although this one is taller than yours. They have a similar mantel (which I still think should be all the way across) but the stain color is much better. AND, the brick is a solid white, not patchy w/gray spots. it makes a diff. maybe your lighting needs to upped.

The brick is also lime washed, not just painted. Distressed to let some of the gray come out. Again there is a tight. I’d get as we have already gone over what we were allotted from our insurance company. The other issue is that if we were to tile over the existing fireplace there is a concern that if another category 4 hurricane hits our home the vibrations of the wind and such from a storm like that would actually make the tile unstable. Not to be rude, but being that we are almost a year out and now just almost finishing this project (because there is a material and contractor shortage here due to the storm) and hurricane season has already started again, I’m not really looking to remodel the fireplace any further. I literally just want to finish the tile hearth and move on. Because my house was freezing this winter because there was a giant hole where the fireplace worked before that just let drafts in my house. I appreciate the sentiment but I literally just want yo finish the hearth so I can move on from this damn hurricane Bs and focus on helping my sister with rebuilding my parents’ home because a tree fell through their house on the storm.

Sorry to be so blunt and dump that all out there- but someone asked for context so there you go

got it. sorry you had to go through all of that. I was just trying to give you some input on finishing up the FP so that it looks good to go w/your new black surround.

Maybe you like that limewash, but all I'm saying is it should be painted a brighter white. The limewash wasn't done correctly.

why not look at the lime slurry link I posted and try that? couldn't hurt.

And I still stand by the mantel comment. the gray stain isn't doing you any favors.

This is what it should look like, with the darker mantel stain. (your limewash was applied too heavy and it looks more like a primer. sorry, it just does) Go over it w/a good masonry white paint.

If you like the look of this white hearth, then look for a white, large format tile, or leftover piece of quartz.

I gave you plenty of info on hearth material in my first comment.

not sure what exactly you're looking for other than larger format tiles. choose the 24x24 or 30x30, 24x48" and cut them to size.

go to a stoneyard ask for some remnants that are going in the trash (they throw away smaller pieces they can't sell) See if you can have them or pay a small price for them. give them your hearth measurement and they'll prob cut it to size for you. polish the edges w/various grits of sandpaper.

Lastly, get mosac tiles on sheets and set those on cement board or suitable tile substrate.

Context pictures for whoever asked. Excuse the mess in one of them- blanket baskets my kid leaves everywhere ha.

Also, the lime wash we used was literally the same thing that is used in that lime slurry post. We followed the directions. The color we used was avorio white

We used Classico Limewash and followed the directions to remove some of it to let the old brick come through for texture.

My dear Andie, bless your heart! (And I say that in the nice way, not the snarky way). So much you've had to go through, I will try to answer the question you asked with no detours.

Here's a 16 X 16 terrazzo tile from tilebar.com Looks dark gray/black

https://www.tilebar.com/true-terrazzo-gabbro-16x16-polished-tile.html

Here's a nice black slate from tileshop.com that is 16 x 24

https://www.tileshop.com/products/adoni-black-slate-floor-tile-16-x-24-in-655374?g2=shape&c=rectangle&sc=

I think the black slate will look nice. If there is a Tile Shop near you and they have it in stock, you can buy it by the piece, don't have to get a whole box.

All the best to you!

Thank you!!! The 16x16 is really what I was looking for! I was trying to buy it at a brick and mortar store since we don’t need a ton :) thank you! I’m going to see if someplace local has these