Opening a period can of worms

[citizensmith]

We've just spent the day stripping wallpaper in the dining room - two layers, came of much easier than expected. I thought the paper might be old, but when you find it is on top of electric cable in a corner you know its late 20th C really. I then got excited about the pale blue paint on the walls until i realised its seems to be some sort of damp proofing paint.

on the plus side the scars are there for 2 different picture rails and i got to have a look at the wall aroundd the fireplace.

the fireplace is a big black slate "marble effect" thing which we loved when we bought the house - I reckon its 1870ish?, but we know the fireplace is in front of an older "inglenook" that has been walled up. The wallpaper has revealed a tantalising set of stone blocks forming what is presumably an edge of the old entry to the inglenook area. There is also an RSJ buried in the wall about 2ft above the mantlepiece.

What to do? Preserve late 19th C or dig back into 18th C? I'm perplexed. Going out now for a beer or two to contemplate. I will try to post some pics tomorrow.

 

[Feltwell]

Hmm - 2 options really:-

You've a nice fireplace that you say you like, that has been there for probably 140 years and is now a part of the history of your house. It's no work to leave it as it is. Or:-

Remove said fireplace, risking damaging it in the process, in order to reveal something that you don't know if you like or not or if it is in any kind of reasnoble condition.

Doesn't sound like much of a contest to me!

 

[middi]

I totally respect your wish for some advise as to what to do, so you can enjoy and live with it happily ever after. Nothing wrong with that.

From my point of view, and in the interest of historical importance, you should think on the lines of restoring whatever the house has inherited during it's progress through the decades or centuries, this way you would be conserving history not only of the house but also of the people and how they lived within the house.
I agree this is a very purist point of view and not always easily applicable or practical. Your instinct should tell you what you would like to conserve and live with or what is an earlier " abortion" from " builders from hell" and not worth conserving.( although this is also history)
If the house is listed a CO could come to your rescue and help you decide, or seek some help from your local conservation society or someone that understands well these old building.
Keep posting on this forum by all means you should get plenty of "food for thought"
Some pictures if you can usually helps.
( you are an "old hand" on the forum, you know how it works. If nobody is able to help, we usually change the subject and take the pee out of each other :wink: :wink: )
Middi

 

[jocelyn plummer]

Maybe it would be useful to consider what form of heat you want from your fireplace---- will it be a coal/log fire burning in a grate, surrounded by the 'marble effect thing', which you say is quite old, or would you like to have a wood burner set back into the inglenook. Actually, thinking about it ( now the gin has worn off) maybe you need to see if you have a chimney in the right place....then of course there is the dreaded budget and associated costs of re-instating!!

Ah well, keep us posted!

 

[Flyfisher]

A can of worms indeed. As others have already described there is no easy, obviously-the-best-thing-to-do, sort of answer.

For what it's worth, we had a similar situation with two fireplaces that were clearly very large inglenooks originally but had been bricked up and the resulting fireplaces were simple grates surrounded by 1950s-looking brickwork and a simple wooden mantlepiece.

We decided to remove the existing fireplaces and open up the original inglenooks; partly because we wanted to install stoves in place of the simple grates and partly because, personally, we preferred the idea of an inglenook fireplace. In doing so, we have certainly removed a part of the history of our house, although I feel the extent of our vandalism is akin to people removing uPVC and replacing it with in-keeping wooden windows, i.e. the removal of something of no particular architectural interest (though I am aware that description is not only subjective but also at the mercy of fashion and that 1950s brick fireplaces may be highly sought-after in decades to come). I hope most people would agree with our actions, though I am sure there will be some who would disagree.

We do, however, have one thing in our defence. Our house is listed and we therefore required Listed Building Consent to open up the fireplaces, which was readily forthcoming after detailed discussions with our very helpful CO. So I like to think we haven't committed a major heritage disaster.

 

[citizensmith]

View attachment 2

View attachment 1

 

[citizensmith]

more pics.

The outside walls are plastered in white plaster (Lime?) with some hair in evidence

The fireplace wall is pink (gypsum) plaster - also with hair in it.

The wall to the left of the fireplace divides the room from the hall corridor. I think the wall was part of the 19th C refit and that the room was much larger before and the fireplace would be more to scale. I am told that it is common for farmhouses to have no hallways, just rooms joined to rooms and that putting in a hallway later (Victorian) is not unusual.

 

[citizensmith]

Sorry - I meant to say wall to the RIGHT of the fireplace!

 

[Penners]

First the requisite mention of Listed Building Consent. If the house is listed, then you will of course need this before you change anything. But if not, the choice is yours.

I, too, think that your heating plans have a bearing on your final decision about the fireplace. But I think the age of the house and your decoration/furnishing plans will have an influence, too.

This is obviously a matter of personal taste, but I don't like the woodburner stuck out in front of the Victorian(?) fireplace, as shown in your photos. I think it detracts considerably from the classical style of the fire surround. If you plan to strike a broadly Victorian theme with your decor, then perhaps you could consider removing the woodburner and restoring the Victorian fireplace to use, as it would originally have been.

Alternatively, if you're after a more country farmhouse style, then an inglenook is perhaps more appropriate to this.

I think my own decision would probably be to keep the Victorian fireplace. That way you are (as Middi suggested) true to the development of the building over the ages and you're not destroying any historic fabric (given that the inglenook will still be there).

But it's your house.....

 

[Gareth Hughes]

The character of the room now is Victorian - fireplace, windows, skirtings (picture rail and cornice if reinstated). Exposing one pre-Victorian feature in that context would look wrong, and going back to a pre-Victorian room as a whole, to suit the exposed large fireplace (it looks earlier than 18th century to me), would require alterations to everything else currently visible in the room. And as you suggest, the original fireplace may relate to a larger original room, in which case the end result of exposing it but keeping the other later alterations will be a hotch-potch that isn't true to any period in the house's history.
Is that a stone lintel ghosting right across the wall from the top of the exposed stone jamb? If so I'd suggest that the left-hand jamb was probably mullered when the present fireplace and steel lintel were inserted, leaving you with a lot of tidying up to do if you do expose it all (to say nothing of the mess that successive infillings of the opening will have made to the back and sides of the inglenook.
It's not an authentic thing to do, but I might keep the exposed jamb as an interesting "archaeological" feature, but otherwise redecorate as a Victorian room to suit the majority of the surviving and reinstatable features. I wouldn't expose the lintel (if that's what it is) as that will become a discordant and dominant element.

 

[citizensmith]

Fortunately (for me) the house is not listed. I am very curious to decipher the sequence of changes in the room though. I think the fireplace will stay as i suspect the left side of the older inglenook has been bashed about when the black one was installed. The RSJ i mentioned is well above the mantle - i exposed a bit, you can see a small black hole in the wall above the mantlepiece just left of centre.

The stove was my fault - a case of doing something a little too quickly. It was fitted at the same time as our other stove in the living room. It does however cut out the draught which was terrible when the fire was open. Its also a lot more effective at heating the room than the old fire grate was! The stack is around 50ft in height and the draw on it was ferocious. I am not sure how to get a round that. I have another pre-lined fireplace in the room next door which needs a log burner at some stage, so it could be moved into use in another room.

I am really curious about the dark "band" above the skirting? and any clues to the true age of the house. I still think its late 1700's but can't prove it. Another thing I want to understand is its construction. Its a big house. Cellar plus 3 floors. The cellar base is stone, from then on its brick. Brickwork gets thinner as house gets higher. We have no solid internal walls at all; only lath & plaster. Just a network of large beams that somehow join up with each other and tie the walls together - it scares me sometimes to think of it!

 

[citizensmith]

Thanks for your comment Gareth - I think you are dead right about the left side of what was there being wrecked. I will probably poke about to see if there is an arch and then skim it back over. I will try to leave the stone in the corner exposed and paper around it. It will end up behind furniture - but i will know its there.

I have a lot to do straightening it all up and fixing damp cause before papering. We are Wm Morris fans and something of that ilk is favourite at present.

Thanks too for your dating comment - I would love to think the place has that age to it, but need more evidence first.

 

[CatherineB]

I am not knowledgeable at all, but for what it's worth, I would vote for leaving the Victorian fireplace. It is part of the house's history now, and an attractive feature in itself rather than an abomination. If you're keeping the rest of the room Victorian, and adding WM paper/fabrics, then again your proposals support keeping the fireplace.

I would get rid of the burner if possible, though, it's not a good look.

 

[Delta]

Personally I agree with the previous comments that suggest keeping the fireplace and go for the Victorian theme to match.

We have a very similar fireplace ourselves and really like it. On ours the hood (flat vertical decorative bit you can see above the wood burner) opens outwards, which controls a pivoted register plate behind it. This means that by closing the hood you stop the draught. Well almost stop it. It's a bit difficult to explain.

As you open the hood, it moves outwards into the room at the bottom, pivoting at the top, the register plate is behind pivoted in the middle and gravity does the rest. Our register is a bit rotten on the edges and lost a corner so you get more draught than you should. Your bad draughts previously may have been due to similar damage, or even a missing plate perhaps. The hood lifts out, and so does the register for sweeping. For info, our fireback is marked "Peveril" with a star of david symbol. I saw a similar one on Salvo, described as a bar-less grate, circa 1905.

I waffle on like this because putting back a nice fireplace to match the surround would be my choice, and I don't think it would have to be draughty. Don't get me wrong I like wood burners too, sat in front of a Clearview now!

P.S. Is the fender original? If so can I have some hi-res images, I'm looking for ideas to finish ours when I remove the aluminium carpet strips that have been nailed through the hearth tiles

 

[CliffordPope]

I would explore first beforel deciding. Then if you decide to stick with the later fireplace, photograph what you have uncovered first.

Or you could insert the victorian fireplace in a different room that perhaps had a plainer or later out of character addition? That way you could preserve both.

 

[AMc]

Me, I'd keep the fireplace - it's old enough to merit staying esp. as you're putting in other Victorian features.
I would also keep the wood burner for comfort. I've had open fires with the hood system as described and they aren't too leaky but they never warm the room as effectively as a stove when they're lit and with a 50ft draw I can imagine you have to feed that fire pretty much continuously.
It's your house, but that's what I would do.

 

[worms]

While I suspect that curiosity would get the better of me (I'd love to see what is behind the replastered bit of wall), I don't think the larger fireplace would look right unless you were removing the right hand wall and restoring the original width of the room.

 

[Moo]

Gareth's said it all, really..

 

[citizensmith]

I had a little poke of the plaster and there's chickenwire underneath part of it. Its not a total mystery that there is a void there. When we had the roof done 3 1/2 years ago scaffolders got very agitated when they found they could rock the whole cimneystack above gutter level. It had to come down and be replaced with a replica. When it was down, the builders got a ladder down the stack and both of them got down there into a "room" about 6ft x 4ft. Somewhere i've got some camera footage of it. The RSJ was seen, but no stonework and as usual here the bricks were spalling. I will investigate to see if there is a beam or arch there as i have to patch plaster anyway.

I've decide to stick with the black slate fire and think about moving the stove to another fireplace we have which has no surround. We were careful not to damage the fireplace when the stove was installed, so i kind of see the stove as a "transitory" bit of fire technology that could easily be removed at any time. I actually have another vey similar black slate surround in bits in the cellar that I bought on ebay for the living room 4 years ago until we found a smaller inglenook when i took out the hideous 1930's/40's tiled fire surround that was there when we bought the house. If i were to reinstate the older opening the room proportions would be all wrong unless the wall was removed, and then i would be simply vandalising one age to expose another.

I just wish i had a time machine so i could go back and be a "fly on the wall" to see what this place used to look like and how everything was organised.

 

[Feltwell]

I just wish i had a time machine so i could go back and be a "fly on the wall" to see what this place used to look like and how everything was organised.

I think we all wish for that with our houses! Whilst it's very satisfying when you can solve a little mystery about how a house used to be, I find that the success rate - or at least the certainty in the results - to be low.