The fad I think a lot of those people will regret is the glass tile backsplashes in kitchens. I think they are ugly now, I'd imagine in a few years no one is going to like these.

I really like our cherry kitchen cabinets. We had white in the condo we lived in before this and I think the natural wood just makes it look like more of a home.

Most people I know don't want a wood burning fireplace at all. When we built our house the construction super said it had been 3 or 4 years since he had put a wood burner in.

I plan to die in this house and not any time soon. I'm sure whoever owns it after me is going to be changing out a lot of stuff and will spend the first week on a backhoe ripping out all my gardens.

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I'm beginning to think that we are much more fucked than I thought.

Not many people do wood burners, especially in new construction. It is more work, and most people just opt for gas. But there is something to be said of the sound, the smell, and the warmth that comes from a wood burning stove or insert. It's comforting in a way that gas just isn't. That, and if you have access to wood, you can heat your home for next to nothing all winter.

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Long Chile was a silly place.

The neighborhood next to mine has big 5,000 sf houses. One of the more prominent ones as you go into the neighborhood was red brick. The new owners painted it white and put up black rain gutters.

We have an old stone fireplace that I'm not going to touch (except building up some pillar-type sides to tie into the mantel I built for it), but we have a sunroom off the LR that has one of its walls, the front wall below the windows and three pillars along the other long wall all built of the same type of stone. It sheds dust like crazy and IMO always looks "dirty", I want to whitewash it to seal the stone to cut down the dust, and brighten up the room.. advice/thoughts/abuse?

Wood stoves in new construction cant happen, home warranty companies wont cover them. We tried.

The cost is also an issue, it'll take five years for us to break even (assuming free wood) on our wood stove and we went with a midrange ~$2000 stove, a Pacific Energy Neo 1.6... built in Duncan. We only have to wait one more week for the install!

All of the soft benefits are worth it... and the fact that the booming metropolis of East Sooke has on average 12 power outages lasting at least an hour during the winter.

Also, he who paints a brick house is an idiot. I wouldn't think twice about painting many interior fireplaces though.

No kidding, I'm getting the Neo 1.6 wood burning insert!

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Long Chile was a silly place.

I didn't know that about the warranty. I've seen a lot of illegal wood burning fireplaces outdoors in new construction. Generally they are roughed in for gas, then just have the gas disconnected to that line (if it was ever connected in the first place...) after inspection and voila, highly illegal outdoor wood burning fireplace in the middle of Oak Bay.

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Long Chile was a silly place.

My wife is an insurance broker and I'm pretty sure the main driving force for gas fireplaces is the conditions that insurance companies put on wood burners. FYI - those people sliding those wood burners in where there's supposed to be a gas appliance. No coverage. They're playing with fire, pardon the pun.

Thanks for the reminder that I need to call my insurance co and get the wood stove coverage.

6 years to pay off the stove now.

Just finished this project last night, took maybe three hours at most. Thanks for the tip!

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The devil made me do it the first time, second time I done it on my own - W

I'm glad my wife isn't into all that white crap. Nothing is harder to keep clean than an entirely white room.

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_____
TEAM HD
Each day is what you make of it so make it the best day possible.

Not all brick fireplaces are equal. Some look very, very dated. The old school brick looks nice, if it's not floor to ceiling, but the 80's multi color is bad.

This thread is why we're going to lose WWIII.

(apologies to vitus)

You would have been further ahead throwing away that piece of "art" that was detracting from your now especially ugly fireplace.

If only some Einstein could create a brick coloured paint....

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Remember - It's important to be comfortable in your own skin... because it turns out society frowns on wearing other people's

Yeah, yeah.

It's a placeholder until our limited edition Thomas Kinkade piece arrives.

So excited!

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The devil made me do it the first time, second time I done it on my own - W

And then it would look like someone painted it trying to make fake brick look like real brick. Doublin' down on tacky.

Sandblaster. End of problem

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Jim
"In dog beers, I've only had one"
http://www.shakercolonial.com/
Creating custom made furnishing to your requirements

Not sterile, not institutional, nor lacking in character...

Edit: Ooops. I thought we were talking about white cabinets mostly.

Nice MDF cabinets, weird why isn't the floor white too?

A large house on our street did nearly the same this past year. The house was listed for something like $220K. We were going to look at it, but decided from the photos that it was too much work. The kitchen needed an entire remodel along with new flooring throughout and more still. It eventually sold. They renovated the entire house. All fads installed. Fake exposed beams. Sliding barn doors. Glass tile backsplash. It was a nice looking brick home on a very nice street. They painted it white. It looks atrocious. They listed it for $600K!!! It still hasn't sold and they've quickly brought it down to $450. I wouldn't buy the thing for what it was listed for before the renovation.

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Gnothi Seauton.