Imagine. Attacked by a Fireplace!!
Imagine… The wonderful party in the newly renovated brownstone has migrated toward the parlor floor. The guest is expounding on some interesting point, and leans fashionably on the marble fire place… which comes crashing down in pieces on top of him; this brownstone owner makes a frenzied call to 911 for an ambulance, which hauls…
Imagine… The wonderful party in the newly renovated brownstone has migrated toward the parlor floor. The guest is expounding on some interesting point, and leans fashionably on the marble fire place… which comes crashing down in pieces on top of him; this brownstone owner makes a frenzied call to 911 for an ambulance, which hauls away said guest. Stunned guests pick their way through the rubble. Party over.
I am afraid of this scenario and imagine that it may happen if my contractor tries to install my mantle fireplaces. I bought them at a salvage place and I decided no way is he going to try to install these things. He is asking ME how to do it, hence my anxiety. I need a specialist. Can somebody help me find one??
Original poster here….Thank you so much for your great info.
You need the help of a specialist fireplace mason. Try Andre Buchanan — recommended previously on this site — at 718-953-2836.
my husband and I had this same problem a few months ago when I bought 2 marble mantles which came in pieces from a salvage store. I called Forbo/Foro (?) Marble who gave me an estimate that cost more than the mantles, but they seemed to know what they were doing. So, my husband insisted that he/we could do it ourselves. First, you can see how a marble or slate fireplace is rebuilt by looking at the restoration project on ourvictorianhouse.com. Also, if you can find a copy of the Old House Journal Compendium, by Clem Labine, there are detailed instructions. Plaster, surprisingly, will keep the marble pieces together, as long as you have the original bricks from the fireplaces to attach the marble to. You have to work very quickly with plaster, however, because it sets up very quickly. The previous excavators in our house had removed the bricks that would have supported the marble mantles and we did not want to have to rebuild that part. We wanted our mantles to be purely decorative, so we built a frame out of 2 x 4’s (screwing them together and using masonry screws to install the frame into the drywall covering the brick) so that the marble would have a support and something to adhere to. We then used a special Liquid Nails adhesive for marble (from Home Depot). Once the Liquid Nails sets, it’s so strong, you cannot take apart the marble pieces. It’s scary how permanent it is.
We used some plaster of paris to put some of the pieces together — like the center medallion, because it was marble to marble. Plaster will not work on marble to wood. You also need some vices/clamps to hold all the pieces together while the plaster or adhesive is setting. We worked on putting together each mantle over a period of a few days because we didn’t have enough clamps and we were worried that the clamps would not be able to hold up the heavy weight of so many parts.
If you don’t want to do this on your own, I would suggest calling a chimney expert. They know how to rebuild fireplaces . . .