Today I’m showing you how I made our DIY faux fireplace under $100! This one was really hard to do a blog post on and I would suggest watching the video tutorial on this DIY faux fireplace under $100 because I feel like that will help you a lot. I made this DIY faux fireplace over the weekend. Although it took longer than I expected, it also turned out better than I thought it would be. Please be kind, I am still a beginner at wood-working and just teaching myself as I make things while sharing what I learned with you. I read a bit about how to do this, but I pretty much just winged it. I knew I wanted to add a DIY faux fireplace in between the living room and dining room in the middle of the two windows. It was the perfect place for it! So I measured how wide I wanted it to be and how deep I wanted it to be. and marked the section off with painters tape.

First thing we did was build the “hearth” which is essentially the bottom piece that the fireplace is going to sit on. We made the hearth for our DIY faux fireplace out of plywood and 2×4’s. This was done on a budget so I didn’t buy the better kind of plywood, I literally got the cheapest they had with the plan that I was going to cover it up anyway.

I built the frame which is like the “skeleton” of the fireplace. I added another cut 2×4 on top, just like the other vertical ones {I don’t have a picture of that for some reason} Watch the video for more details on the process. 

Next, I cut down masonite, which is “tempered hardboard” I got at Menards. I attached it to my frame with a nail gun using Brad nails. I know my measurements are a bit a lot off, but I came to a solution.

I added cut 2×12 to the side corners and where the wall meets the fireplace. I made a little box for the center out of plywood.

I still felt like it needed more, so I got some crown molding from Lowes and attached it to the top, under the mantle.

The mantle is just a piece of 2×12 4′ construction lumber I got for $7.17 at Menards. I just stained it and trimmed it down a little.

I put some stain on the plywood and used plain white paint on the rest. It took around 4 coats of paint! Masonite/tempered hardboard soaks the paint up a lot.

MATERIALS

2×4 / Tempered Hardboard / Plywood / Crown Moulding / Stain / Latex Paint