It’s one of my favorite times of the month again – it’s our Monthly DIY Challenge! If you haven’t been following along, me and a group of my best blogger friends choose an item each month and then challenge ourselves to use that item in a creative way. It’s a ton of fun and a good way to get those creative juices flowing and start thinking out of the box. Starting in December, we will be posting our challenges on the 2nd Wednesday of every month, so be sure to come back and check out what we have up our sleeves! So far we’ve done crate projects and pumpkin projects and this month our featured item is wood slices! I’m so excited to share my project with you, even if I had a couple of hiccups along the way. Wood is one of my favorite materials in home decor and the warm tones it brings just adds a whole new level of cozy to any space! Without further ado, here is my wood slice fireplace facade!
Be sure to stick around to the end of the post here you can click around and see everyone else’s projects! 🙂
I’ve done a project with this material before with my wood round ring holder, but I knew right away when we decided on wood slices that I wanted to create a fireplace facade for the inside of my newly painted white brick fireplace. I was inspired by this pin that I had found on Pinterest several weeks before. I just knew that I had to recreate it and that it would be the perfect touch to my slowly-evolving living room! We’ve recently started having fires in our fireplace and as a result there are always bits of charred logs and ash that look not-so-classy. This fireplace facade will be a good cover-up for all this junk:
My first problem was procuring said wood slices. I don’t own nor have never operated any sort of saw, and even if I did have a saw, there was only one tree out of all the trees in my yard that I would be willing to cut down and all were all sopping wet after weeks of rain! I knew I needed a lot of wood slices to make this project work, so I looked into buying them. At $8-$10 a pop, I knew it would be WAY too expensive to get all the materials I needed. Luckily a friend came to the rescue and cut up some of the firewood he had lying around in his backyard into rounds that I could use for my facade! The day is saved!
The next thing that I needed was a piece of plywood that would fit nicely inside my fireplace opening. I’ve never bought wood before, so I thought I would bravely head to Home Depot alone and give it a shot. After asking about 3 employees if I could get some plywood cut, I finally ended up talking to a gentleman who said that their saw was broken and they wouldn’t be able to cut anything for me. Just my luck!
So I turned around and headed back past my house and double the distance in the opposite direction to Lowes. I found the wood section easily and messily maneuvered a giant piece of plywood onto a cart, which I’m sure was quite humorous to any passersby as a tiny 5’3″ girl in a dress tried to coax an 8×4 piece of heavy plywood to do her bidding. After wrangling the beast I got in line for the wood cutter behind a pair of men who only had about 80 bajillion pieces they needed cut. And then halfway through their bajillion pieces, the wood cutter guy decided he needed to go on break, so then we waited another 15 minutes for his replacement to come and finish the other half bajillion. When it was finally my turn, I told the employee I only needed a 2×3 piece of plywood, he chuckled and told me that 3 aisles over, hidden underneath some crown molding, were plywood pieces that were 2×4 and that I should have gotten one of those. Out of line I go in hunt of the smaller plywood; I found it easily, but then had to wait in line again so that I could get the extra foot cut off. All to say, it too me about an hour and a half+ to get one measly 2×3 sheet of plywood. Wowzers. Phew!
After I got the plywood home, I gave it three quick coats of flat black spray paint. The coats dried really quickly and the end result was the perfect dark black background that would house my wood slices:
I laid out the rounds to see how they would fit and then started gluing down each one using Gorilla brand wood glue. To make sure they really stuck, I stood on top of each one after I had glued it down! The bottle says to clamp the wood but I don’t have that many clamps, and really, ain’t nobody got time fo’ that. So I just gave ’em a good stepping on and called it good.
After everything was glued down and stepped on, I left it to dry overnight laying nice and flat. I think it turned out pretty well for having run into so many problems in the beginning!
Now it was time to put ‘er up in my fireplace! That sucker was heavy after all the wood slices had been glued on! I fit it into the fireplace and stood back to admire my handiwork. I think it turned out pretty cool and classy for having run into so many problems along the way!
It’s not perfect in the least, but I think it adds some fun textural and natural elements that makes the fireplace feel more complete. The circles of the wood are even mirrored in my newly put up Thankful Banner!
The next thing to go is that horrid puke green half wall! Seriously can’t wait until it’s gone. Once the pallet wood wall is up, this room will feel SO much more complete and put together.
Now be sure to check out all of the other FAB wood slice projects that my blogger friends came up with by clicking on any of the pictures below!
You crack me up Erica!! I LOVE it though, it looks really great!
Haha, thanks Leigh Anne! I’m really glad it ended up working out despite all my ridiculous mishaps 😉
Your fireplace looks great Erica! I think that was a fabulous idea! And lucky you didn’t have to buy all those slices! Hope you can sit back now and have a relaxing weekend friend 😉
I know, phew! I was really freaking about this challenged, but by some miracle I got it done. Yay for the weekend!
Ugh! Sorry you had so much trouble with this! You need to invest in a saw, girl! It was totally all worth it though because this looks awesome!! Your fireplace has really come a long way!
Thank you!! I seriously do need to invest in a saw! It would make my life so much easier. Maybe I’ll ask Santa for some power tools 😉
Totally worth the effort my friend! I definitely need one of these babies in front of our fireplace! LOVE how rustic and clean it looks!!!
Thanks, Kristi! It definitely was worth the effort in the end, but it was a pain getting there! I really like how it looks though and it would TOTALLY be perfect for your killer fireplace!
I love this, Erica! Your fireplace looks so good with it’s new white paint and now your wood slice facade!
Thanks Amy! The room is slowly transforming, and I love the direction it’s taking! Now to tackle the beastly wall 🙂
This is so awesome!! But I think what I love most is your story about getting the plywood. That is hilarious. And so something I would go through (except that I have no patience and would have been huffing and puffing about how ridiculous the wait was). Super fab addition to the beautiful new fireplace!
Haha I was silently fuming the whole time! There was no way I was leaving without that ruddy piece of wood! I felt like a total idiot trying to get the plywood and then realizing I could have got a smaller size. Now I know for next time so I don’t make the same mistake!
Oh wow, you really ran into quite the conundrum for some plywood. All that trouble was worth it though, cause it looks awesome! Great job! Your living room is looking amazing!
Thanks Tara! It was worth it in the end, but man, this whole project was a struggle for me! Haha 🙂
You are too funny! Your effort definitely paid off and your fireplace looks amazing!
Haha, thanks Katie! It was an effort, but I’m really happy with how it turned out!
I want to do this to our faux fireplace! Now I have the tutorial to move forward! Gorilla glue is amazing!
It totally is amazing! I was a bit scared to buy it at first because one time I got regular Gorilla glue on my hands and for the life of me couldn’t get it off no matter what I tried! I was more careful with the wood glue and no sticky fingers this time 🙂
Holy smokes! This is awesome! Way to work the monthly project, lady. It really makes the fireplace look so complete.
Thanks, Christina! It was worth the struggle 🙂
What a clever idea! I especially love how it looks behind the fireplace screen
Thanks so much, Rachel! I agree, I think it looks even more like real logs when the fireplace screen is up since it tricks your eyes a little bit! 😉
I love this! Eventually we are going to put a fireplace/mantle into our living room and I’d love to do something like this for the winter season. Simple and yet very visual and lovely 🙂
Thanks so much, Erin! I’m really happy with how it turned out 🙂 Plus it keeps draftiness down, too. Win-win!
Definitely worth the effort, Erica! It looks amazing and makes a nice focal piece for the room!
Thanks so much, Nicole! I like what it does for the room, too 🙂
Is it easy to remove so you can use the fireplace?
Absolutely, Karin! It’s basically just sitting right in front of the hole. So all I have to do is lift up the board and put it to the side and then we can have a roaring toasty fire! 🙂
Wow it looks really fab! 🙂
Thanks so much, Nicole! 🙂
fabulous! and love the kitty.
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Thank you!! I’m really pleased with the end result and I love my little kitty fashion model too! 😉
Just now getting around to this! But, LOVE. IT. It turned out so perfect, despite quite the time you had putting it together! It looks so great next to your newly white painted brick. Nice work!! 🙂
Thanks, Amanda! It was kind of a pain in the butt, but I’m glad it turned out so well 🙂 Next on the list is to tackle the barf wall behind it!
What a fantastic piece of innovation. Gives a great look to the room. I have always personally preferred the looks and uses of a working fireplace. However, the ascetics of your wood slice fireplace façade have me reconsidering my position!
Thanks so much, Patricia! I really love the façade because it’s easy to remove when we want to have a fire and then easy to put back to change up the look or hide the old ashes. I like having the option to mix it up! 🙂
I have a fireplace in my home, but it doesn’t work, and it costs too much to repair. I love your idea to add logs inside of the fireplace so that you can still keep it for decoration purposes. I definitely agree that it adds fun textural and natural elements to your room. Thanks for sharing!
Thank you so much for stopping by and for your kind words, Meg! I definitely love it as a textural/natural element and I also like that it keeps my cats from playing in the soot! I’ve also seen people put a bunch of pillar candles in unused/broken fireplaces which is quite pretty too!
Great project. Looks very convenient for fire place.
Thanks so much! It’s definitely a great way to hide the soot and charcoal until we are ready to use it again!