Many owners of private suburban real estate have a fireplace in the house. This element of luxury that embodies comfort inevitably becomes the epicenter of attention of any room where it is located. In most cases, it is equipped in the living room, and therefore its appearance should cause sympathy. And among all the materials available, the facing of fireplaces with natural stone looks more impressive and bewitching.
Features of choice
Although the finish is not affected by a sharp temperature difference, it is still located inside the living room. Therefore, it is important to ensure complete safety in the use of the fireplace - its materials should not emit harmful substances. This means that the use of slate, granite or sandstone is highly undesirable.
This is due to the fact that these stones are capable of emitting gases that adversely affect human health. In addition, they stand out even with slight heating. Therefore, to decorate the fireplace with natural stone, you should opt for a noble rock of volcanic origin. For a budget project, naked people or large pebbles are suitable. In addition, embossed concrete products also come in handy.
For beauty
But a more attractive fireplace design can be created by using basalt, diabase, jadeite, with the help of which bath stoves are usually laid. Even if they are heated very much, there is no harmful discharge from them, which means that their use is fully safe. Also very popular are marble, shell rock, limestone, sandstone.
It is better to choose the stones for the lining of your fireplace yourself and it is better to pay attention to flat pancakes of various sizes. But equilateral pebbles of the same thickness will also fit - they can fill empty spaces during the bookmark. Also, when decorating the fireplace with natural stone, you should purchase raw material or with an average degree of grinding. In this case, you can create a more natural look that is closest to nature.
The advantages of natural material
Increasingly, people are resorting to using natural stones to decorate their fireplaces. This is due to understandable reasons:
- Any other material, especially all varieties of artificial origin, will not be able to compare with natural stone in terms of aesthetics.
- When heating natural material, the air is not polluted by smoke or hazardous substances.
- Natural stones are able to withstand large physical loads, including shock.
- The stone is able to withstand high temperatures.
- In addition, natural material can be processed, so you can turn your fantasies into reality. At the same time, the natural color will be in harmony with any environment.
Another advantage of natural stone in the decoration of fireplaces is that its use allows, almost literally, to plunge into the Middle Ages.
Natural stone finish
Facing a fireplace is a responsible and difficult process, despite the apparent lightness. In many respects, everything depends not only on the physical properties of the material used, the technology of its production also plays an equally important role.
Therefore, such work requires the presence of certain skills, abilities, as well as a serious preparatory stage. If, nevertheless, the stones were acquired of different sizes and shapes, then they should first be adjusted to each other in size. It is also advisable to select the necessary shade so that the color scheme successfully harmonizes with the living room decor. And for this you can not do without the help of a stone-cutting machine or grinder with the corresponding disks.
Surface preparation
The recipe for creating home luxury is simple - a fireplace, natural stone (proof photo below), a portion of desire and room for creativity. And to obtain such a result, you should carefully prepare the surface before laying the cladding. In this case, special attention should be paid to the primer - without this mandatory stage, nothing will work. And the better the composition, the better. For example, the Knauf Tiefengrund primer has these essential qualities. But you can also choose acrylic-based products - Dufa Putzgrund, Marshall Export Base, but only those that are designed for indoor use.
In addition, a reinforcing mesh with cells of 50x50 mm should be fixed on the brickwork. At the same time, the use of fasteners with plastic plugs is strongly discouraged. Instead, it is necessary to use metal anchor wedges (6 mm in diameter), and the attachment points themselves must be placed in increments of 250 to 300 mm.
Moreover, the fastening should not be in the seam, but directly in the body of the brick. Masonry cracking can be avoided by lowering the rotational speed of the punch. As you can see, the photo of the fireplace decoration with stone (and not with artificial, but with material of natural origin) is simply mesmerizing. To create such a masterpiece can only be hard work, doing everything with style.
Additional measure
As an additional measure for facing, you can make several notches (the more the better) on the surface of the bricks with a hammer and a chisel. This will also significantly increase the adhesive properties of the surface of the walls of the fireplace. Only carry out this procedure before coating with a primer.
At the end, the surface should be clean and, if necessary, dusted off. For reliability, it is possible to apply a primer layer again using a manual spray gun.
Decoration schemes
The entire surface of the family hearth can be divided into separate flat areas, which will greatly simplify the implementation of the fireplace lining of natural stone. As a rule, this is the front and side walls. You can also expand the bottom to allow the formation of a base. As for the fireplace shelf, it cannot be finished with stone in order to keep its surface functional.
All flat areas of the fireplace should be depicted on an A4 sheet indicating all key sizes. According to the received "pattern" to lay facing stones on the floor, and as close as possible, collecting in a kind of "mosaic". So it’s much easier to select all the elements and, if necessary, file them for a perfect fit to each other.
It is important to consider not only the size of each element of the decor, but also its shape, so that the overall picture is harmonious. And the layout on the floor will allow this to be achieved best - by applying stones to each other, you can visually assess their ratio.
Do not forget about the seams between the elements of the "mosaic", which should be from 20 to 25 mm. But the facing of fireplaces with natural stone looks better when their size is not more than 5-6 mm.
Material Fit
Even if these are irregularly shaped stones, fitting them close to each other is not as difficult as it might seem at first glance. But preserving the original appearance of the faces is already problematic. This can be corrected, since many stones are easy to process.
The faces can be given the desired shape by cutting off the excess with a disk on concrete to an angle grinder. If it is necessary to create chips and breaks, they can be made with a pickaxe. A disk grinding disc may also come in handy.
To avoid confusion, it is worth numbering each stone. In addition, it does not hurt to somehow designate the joints of parts from the wrong side. Alternatively, simply draw an arrow that will indicate the direction of installation.
Before the cutting or grinding process, it is imperative to moisten the stones with water. This will avoid dusting the workplace, as well as look at the result without distortion due to uneven refraction.
Glue selection
For a fireplace lining, stone has the same meaning as an adhesive. When using hard rocks without defects, the life of the cladding will largely depend on the reliability and quality of the adhesive, as well as its adhesion to the brick surface. Cement mortar in this temperature regime is simply not able to work for a long time. In this regard, the choice comes down to two options:
- Purchase of ready-made special mix.
- Self-preparation of adhesive using refractory clay based on chamotte powder.
Buying the finished glue does not result in certain difficulties; as a rule, it is enough to purchase Ceresit ST-17 or Knauf “Marble”. You can also pay attention to highly specialized formulations like Scanmix Fire. However, there is one limitation, which is the maximum thickness of the seam.
Regarding natural stones to the fireplace, their peculiarity is that before laying irregularly shaped mosaic elements, they should be carefully adjusted to each other. When using artificial stones, there is no such problem, but at the same time, the appearance is not so attractive.
Cooking yourself
A solution made by yourself simplifies things a bit. With its help, stones can be laid without the grinding procedure, which will give more aesthetics. The ratio of dry ingredients is as follows - 3 parts of chamotte clay, 1 part of river or mountain sand, 1 part of cement (grade 300, not lower).
Clay must first be passed through a sieve, which will get rid of garbage and other inclusions. Then pour water and leave aside for 40-50 hours. Now you can mix the rest of the components - sand (its presence will prevent cracking when the solution begins to set) and cement (thanks to it, adhesion increases and the setting process is significantly accelerated). Moreover, the last ingredient should be added before the masonry itself. That's all - the glue for facing fireplaces and stoves with natural stone is ready.
The use of various heat-resistant plasticizers will also be justified. Mixing all this is easier with a mixer or armed with a drill with the appropriate nozzle.
Cladding technology
Fireplace facing always starts from the bottom of the front side. Laying out the initial row horizontally, you should move further up. In this case, the largest and thickest elements are laid in the first place. And only after that it is possible to proceed to filling the remaining space with small pebbles. You can adjust their position by increasing the amount of glue. Smaller gaps can be removed at the very end of the work with small pieces.
Stones must be laid on a continuous layer of mortar so that there are no voids. To achieve this, you will have to tear off each element more than once, then put it back in its place. This will make sure that all cavities are filled with glue. Only this approach will give the stove or fireplace made of natural stone a more attractive and natural look.
Having finished with the front of the fireplace, you should go to its side surfaces. At the same time, protruding elements can be at the edges of the front part, as well as in the throat of the furnace. They will be removed after the adhesive solution has completely dried, and the easiest way to do this is by grinding with a disk disc. In the meantime, you need to do the rest of the planes.
Completion
The composition has not yet dried, it is worth expanding the seams, for which it is enough to simply walk with your finger, forming a semicircular hollow. You can also go the other way - to wait until everything dries, and then trim and grind the protruding parts of the stones.
At the final stage, the gaps between the stones should be filled with a tinted glue mixture, which is convenient to make with a confectionery syringe or some bag with a cut corner (soft packaging for milk). The result is a seam with fancy influxes. Some stones can be varnished, which will give a special shine, and at the same time extend the life of the fireplace lining with natural stone.
Arch formation
Give some connoisseurs originality, and the more it is, the more attractive the fireplace looks. As an option, create an arch at the cladding stage. However, it should be borne in mind that this is the most difficult, but at the same time quite feasible work. Therefore, it is worth weighing everything beforehand, and only then make a decision. Yes, it is beautiful, but you have to work hard for the desired effect.
It is necessary to realize such an idea even at the initial stage of work when the front is being finished. For starters, two columns should be laid out on the stones on both sides of the opening. At the same time, they should protrude above the common front surface by an amount equal to the protrusion of the arched vault.
Now the difficulties begin: you need to choose the right stones. At the same time, do not forget about the highlight of any arched opening - the cornerstone of a trapezoidal shape and large size. It is installed strictly in the center. And since this is the most noticeable element of the whole “mosaic”, it is advisable to choose the most beautiful specimen, which will allow it to be favorably highlighted against the background of the entire facing of fireplaces with natural stone.
If all the elements were carefully adjusted, and more than once to dry, then the arch will hold, even when cracking dried glue. It is the central stone that will not allow the entire structure to collapse.
In conclusion
The presence in the house of a fireplace with an open fire in itself creates a favorable comfortable and cozy atmosphere. This setting is best conducive to a friendly conversation on the background of the tea ceremony. In addition, you can simply watch how the flame, as if alive, absorbs its "meal" and listen to the crackling of logs. No wonder folk wisdom says: you can endlessly look at three things, and fire is just on this list.
And if the fireplace also has a design that is pleasant to the eye, then there is simply no price for it! Of course, there can be much more options for finishing this interior decor. It is worth giving free rein to your imagination, and the result can even exceed all expectations!