DESIGN IDEA: DIY Fireplace Veneer - Reclaimed Roofing Slate

For three years now I have been waiting and looking for ways that I can do some work on our house myself.  Up until now everything has involved big power tools and some knowledge of construction (or so it has seemed) so I have left it to the "professionals" (quotation marks intended!).  What's more, we have been looking for ways to use reclaimed materials and so far we have had no luck getting any contractors to jump in and embrace our vision.  But the moment has arrived.  This fireplace veneer project is clearly a DIY opportunity and any DIY opportunity is an opportunity to try using reclaimed materials. 

With that in mind, I have been looking for reclaimed slate or bluestone tiles.  What I have discovered is that used roofing slate has three qualities that make it a good candidate for this project:

• abundant
• cheap
• easy to cut

At this very moment there is a woman in Queens selling old roofing slate tiles for fifty cents a pop.  Here is the pic from her posting:



I emailed her and she says I can pick through the pile and take the ones I want.

I also watched a few videos on how to cut slate roof tiles and it is so simple that a 7 year-old can do it!  Here is my favorite video:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s_x0V2uQ1Es 

And look! Slate is so easy to cut that this person made a slate moose mosaic on their roof:

The one thing I can't find online is images of examples of other peoples' reclaimed roofing slate veneer projects.  Mostly, people who seek uses for reclaimed slate seem to just paint a border on a big tile and then write their dinner menu on it or some such quaint thing.  Bummer.  If we go this route, we might be the first to write about it.  No promises.  Just an idea.

DESIGN IDEA: Stone Face Hearth

It turns out that these two stone options which we like are both sold as 6"x24" tiles with glue backing holding the pieces together.  They cost $12 @ sq. ft. and we need to cover approximately 64 Square Feet.

I am told this one is probably slate.  The hearthstone is a honed and polished bluestone or slate - we still need to get the hearthstone.

And this one is something like quartzite or some other stone.  Dunno what for sure, but it isn't bluestone.

One advantage of this stuff is that because it comes as tiles it can be installed as tile with quick set tile adhesive, so we we can have our tile guy do it and won't need to hire a stone mason -- and that is a good thing because the last thing I want is to have to find and deal with yet another contractor.  What we spend on the tile we will probably save on the install.

DESIGN IDEAS: Fireplace/Hearth Veneers

There is still a lot to do on the house, but on the top two floors we have finally come to the point where we need to pick out surface finishes (as evidenced by all the recent posts about flooring tile and hardwood.  Despite being at that point, we are putting off a lot of finish work and trying to just focus on those elements of the house that need to be finished before we can get a C of O (the Certificate of Occupancy is the Building Department's stamp of approval for people to occupy a building and a prerequisite for getting normal homeowners' insurance and a mortgage).  So, for instance, we don't actually have to put down flooring to get the C of O.  Instead, we are allowed to just paint the floors and then put down rugs - which is probably what we will do in the bedroom and living room.  

However, there are certain places where putting down the finishes is necessary to get the C of O.   Examples: (1) we need a working bathroom but you can't use an untiled shower so we have to tile the shower and we might as well tile the rest of the bath while we're at it; (2) we need a working kitchen but you cannot have a stove in a room without fire-rated sheetrock walls and ceiling so we have to decide what kind of stove ventilation and lighting we will use in the kitchen because vent and lighting rough elements must be installed before the sheetrock goes up.

And then there is the fireplace.  Although we are not required to have a working fireplace to get a C of O, it is a priority for us since we want the extra heat source so we can avoid big bills from using the electric baseboard heating.  It will be easy enough to have a fireplace installed since we are going to have a woodstove insert fireplace - all we have to do is call the store and have them come out and install the chimney liner and the stove of our choice.  The problem is that we don't want to pay to install the nice new fireplace insert before we have finished the fireplace surround/hearth.  Otherwise, we risk that the insert will have to be removed before the veneer is done or, worse, the insert could get damaged.

Here is the fireplace we need to finish:

Although we don't have photos of what it looked like before the fire, the bottom surface of the fireplace and the bench/ledge in front is a large bluestone slab so we assume the whole thing was faced in a bluestone veneer.  We have discussed just going with that again but, as with most things, the word "just" has no place in this process.  There are dozens of different shades of bluestone and even more styles of veneer.

Here are some examples:

I believe this is called "snap edge".  I like it, but not as much as the smoother finished looking stuff.

I like this A LOT!  What is this called?

Here are a few I like a lot, although some may not be ideally suited for our overall aesthetic.

This one I think would work well.

I like this a lot too - not sure we could do that break between snap edge and smooth.

One big slab - great looking but too contemporary I think.

Probably perfect for us.

Lovely but too contemporary.

Same.

I like this shape and size - but I want to keep it in a tighter blue/grey spectrum.

I like this style, but I don't really care for the gold and red stones.  I would prefer to keep it well within the grey/blue range.

No.

Heavens, no!

Absolutely not.

Nope.

GORIGNAK!! NOOOOOO!!!!

Design Decision: Gauged Black Slate Kitchen Floors

To be clear, at the time of the last post, I had not yet purchased any slate.  I had only located a nice heap of it and negotiated a good price.  I then brought home a piece for consideration.

After some discussion and some web surfing, we determined that black slate is actually pretty fantastic looking for a kitchen floor. 

Some background: V has said a few times over the past month as we discussed kitchen floor material choices that she imagines something a little "moody" for the kitchen floor - "moodier" than honed white marble.  When I asked what "moody" means she said, basically, darker.  Then she put together that post of slate floors.  I get it now.

So, what did I get?

How did I find this slate? Simple.  I went out to check out a few stoop sales this morning while the baby was napping.  Notably, one of the stoop sale proprietors had advertised on Craigslist that she had some black slate floor tiles.  So, I went to her stoop sale and, after buying a stained glass window (to be featured in a subsequent post) and a large part of her collection of old photographic equipment, I remembered to ask about the slate (to be honest, I almost forgot about it - too distracted by the photo stuff).  

I was expecting her to say she had maybe ten to twenty 12"x12" slate tiles leftover from a renovation, but her answer exceeded all expectations.  At first she didn't know how much she had, but she said it was enough for the kitchen renovation she and her late husband had been planning 40 years ago and never got around to.  She explained that they only re-did their bathroom floor and then left the rest of the slate in the basement.  How much was there I asked again? She said she would check.  She went down to her basement and came back up with a single sealed box of black "gauged" slate tiles in various sizes which, all combined, added up to 10 Sq. Ft.  

I asked how many boxes she had and she said 27!! 270 Square Feet!  More than we need.

Anyway, the tiles are in a variety of sizes and the box includes two alternative layouts for arranging them in a repeating pattern.

I prefer this layout.

I don't like this layout as much because it will result in two 9x12 tiles being stacked one on top of the other in repeating pairs.

So, I took one 6"x6" tile home to show V.  But at this point I am thinking that I really like how this slate looks.  It is much smoother than the slate I am used to seeing.  The stony surface of it does not have the deep irregularities you often seen in slate but it still has plenty of character.  Apparently, "gauged" means that it has been ground down to a relatively regular thickness so it ends up smoother.  And it can be oiled to make it even deeper/richer looking.

Here is the sample tile I took home.

Once V saw it, she confirmed that it looks great.  Suddenly, we were both very excited about the slate - and not just because it was only $1 per Sq. Ft.  Actually, it is not such a huge discount since slate seems to sell for between $2.50 and $5 per Sq. Ft.   We just really like it.  

Anyway, I hadn't actually bought the slate at this point.  I had only brought home the one sample tile you see above and the seller had assured me she would hold it all for me.  Still, we wanted to be certain.  So, just to make sure we were positive, we drove down to Classic Tile to check out what else we might be able to get new in a reasonable price range.  We looked at a lot of tile and, in the end, there was nothing in or even close to our price range that we liked as much as the slate.  So, we pulled the trigger and bought two big bags of grout in a contrasting color (grout color choices to be discussed in a subsequent post).

I drove V and S home and then I went to pick up the slate.  It took more than a dozen trips down to the seller's basement to bring up 24 boxes.  I left the last 4 boxes behind - I can go buy them if I want, but I didn't want to overload my car too too much. 

Before I left with my haul, the seller showed me her bathroom floor, installed 40 years ago, made of this slate:

Nice, right?

So, now we have 240 square feet of gauged black slate quarried in Canada some time in the early 1970's.  A stone can't really be vintage though, can it?

Whatever, it is ours and tomorrow I meet with the tile guy.

Black Slate Kitchen Floors

J just returned from a stoop sale with a haul of $1/sq ft black slate in irregular rectangles. Here are some images. I think it's pretty! Modern but rustic. Would look classy with white and wood, a la that kitchen pic below from HGTV.

cotedetexas.blogspot

kitchensanddesigns.blogspot

United Stone and Graphic Arts Oc '10.

Michael Graydon - a Tommy Smythe room for HGTV

The pattern