I just finished a project that didn’t take too long and wasn’t too difficult, but has a huge impact. The fireplace in our home is in the corner and angled. It seems like the perfect high impact focal point, so to enhance the fireplace and make it really stand out, I added a bunch of moulding and painted the mantel black.

Check it out.

Here’s a refresher of what it looked like when we moved in, and a week ago:

{Way Before and Before}
  

Such a dramatic difference, right?!

I couldn’t be any more pleased with how it turned out. It definitely has that WOW factor that jumps out at you the second you enter the room.

I gathered lots of inspiration photos before I tackled this project. Too see all my inspiration, visit my Fireplace Pinboard. I have to say though that my love for a black mantel is directly inspired from Sarah of The Yellow Cape Cod. Her style is amazing.

This fireplace has come a loooong way. Check it out when we first moved in. Looks like a bachelor pad with that art and the gumball machine.

and now!

Even I do a double take. It’s seriously amazing what a little elbow grease and some paint will do for a room.

What good is a post without a tutorial? Here’s how I went from blah to Vavoom.

I started with a drawing. Most of my projects start on paper as chicken scratch. I drew a very-not-to-scale sketch of the fireplace, then added my trim. Once it was drawn I measured the entire fireplace and added my measurements to the drawing.

Before I started nailing wood to the wall I did a trial run with painter’s tape just to make sure I liked the look and spacing of everything.

When I did the board and batten in my daughter’s room, I bought too many sheets of MDF. I have enough strips of 4″ wide MDF to board and batten this entire house! I’ve been finding all sorts of projects to use this stuff on.

For this project I used my 4″ wide strips of MDF to frame out the mantel. I started by adding strips down either side of the angled wall.

Pardon all the stereo equipment on the floor. Ben was tinkering with all of it and then had to leave town for business, so I worked around it until I got sick enough of stepping over it. Then I moved it. I love keeping it real over here.

Then I added my horizontal strips. Make sure you measure and use a level before nailing your boards to the wall.

I finished up the MDF planks by adding the vertical ones. Some pieces are white because they are leftover from another project.

After that I was pooped and went to bed. I guess that’s what happens when you start a project at 7pm.

The next morning I got the kids off to school and finished my project. I spackled all the holes in the wall and I used wood putty on all the nail holes in the MDF. Then I used paintable caulk to fill all the edges for a crisp clean look.

TIP: when filling nail holes in MDF, use wood putty instead of spackle. The spackle is too wet and will cause the MDF to swell.

I also taped off my ceiling and side walls to help protect my gray walls from getting primer and paint all over them.

You always want to prime the MDF before painting (unless using a primer and paint in one). Otherwise you will end up doing 20 coats of paint to cover the MDF. For the planks I used Zinseer Bull’s Eye 1-2-3 Primer. I’m not married to it, but it works well and is what I had in the garage. Please note, I used a different primer for the tile. Read on for those details.

I primed all the MDF planks with a paint brush. I didn’t want to dirty up a roller as well. But when it came time for painting I did use a roller on it.

In the middle of all the planking and priming I also started to prep the tile for a new paint job. There is absolutely no reason I used blue and green tape on this project other than it’s what I grabbed first. The blue Scotch tape and the green Frog tape both are such exceptional products that I really have no preference of one over the other.

I used a Zinseer primer called BIN Primer. It’s suppose to adhere better to stuff like tile.

After priming the tile I got busy painting all the new moulding and wall. For all my trim work in my house I always use the same color – Alabaster by Sherwin Williams (except the laundry room trim is color matched to the ikea built-ins). For this trim I bought a satin finish so the texture on the walls wouldn’t be so glaringly obvious.

To paint all the trim I first used a 2″ wide angled brush (my favorite is the stubby one from Purdy) on all edges. Then for an extra smooth finish I rolled the white paint onto the walls with a little fluffy roller for textured walls. I also rolled the paint onto the planks using a very smooth roller for smooth surfaces.

During all of this fireplace chaos did I mention my husband was on a business trip? Oh, and the kids insisted they “decorate” for Halloween. While I’m cutting and painting and trimming, I also went in the attic and got out all the Halloween decorations. THIS is literally my life:

Finally it was time for all the black paint! It took me two coats (plus some touch-ups) to get the mantel and tile covered. Here’s the mantel after the first coat.

The black I used is called Francesca by Martha Stewart. I got it in the Glidden primer and paint in one in a semi-gloss finish. I used this same paint on the tile as well.

I have no idea if it will stick to the tile long-term. We never touch the tile or walk on it, so ours will probably work fine but if you do this project yourself you might want to double-check if this type of paint will work.)

When I was done I had a few little touch-ups and hard to reach places so I used a very small paint brush for that.

After two coats, it’s looking pretty fresh. I didn’t roll any black on, I used a paint brush for everything.

So, what do you think? Are you a fan of dramatic black mantels?

I love going back to my archives and looking at pictures of my house two years ago. It’s amazing how much my style has transformed and also how far this house has come. It was fun pulling old photos for this post.