Hey, it's Mark from Top Homeowner. And in this video, I'm gonna cover a few different ways to dress up your gas fireplace. You can replace the media in the bottom of your fireplace. Now, this here is what's called vermiculite. This is a brownish champagne color media, and this is in a lot of gas fireplaces.

Basically, it's just designed to hide the metal part of the bottom of the fireplace and make it look a little bit more realistic, but also give it a little bit of shine, a little bit of shimmer, and be able to hide the fact that it's just completely a metal box. You can add some other elements in here to dress it up as well. So in the bottom, we've got some pieces of lava rock, and that makes it look like there's some extra pieces of log that had been burnt left over some charcoal pieces that haven't burned up all the way just to give it a little bit more realism.

Again, you can also add some other pieces, like they make some glass elements that you can put in here, and that's really designed to reflect and bounce the light off just to give the flames a little bit more of an enhanced look. And certainly you could also put in some fire glass to cover the bottom.

If you want a really modern look. Usually, the glass is typically found in a fire pit, but there's absolutely no reason why you can't use it in an indoor gas burning fireplace. You can add or replace Rock Wool that stays on top of the burners. And what this stuff does is it helps to distribute the flame to make it more of an even burn, and it also adds a glowing Ember effect. This stuff lasts a long time, but it can wear out.

So this is a really cheap way of enhancing the look of your fireplace, especially if you don't have it. Another thing you can do is you can actually replace the logs that are inside the fireplace. Now, there are a lot of different options for this, and some of these look really realistic, depending on how fancy and how expensive you want to go. They make different styles, they make different shapes, and they even make different types of wood. So, for example, if you want your fireplace to look a little bit more modern, you can go with a fireplace log that looks like a Birch-style log, which makes it whiter and brighter on the inside.

The other thing you can do is if you want a little bit more rustic look, you can go with like, a split Oak, and that will make it look a lot more realistic, a lot more like it's an actual wood burning fireplace. So if you really want your fireplace to stand out and have a really modern look, if you combine glass with, like, say, a Birch log, that's going to give it a really modern design and make it stand out. Now, the amount of money you can spend on these logs varies quite a bit.

There are some that are under $100, and there are some that are well over $100, depending on how realistic you want it to get. But in the end, this is a centerpiece to your living room, so spending a little bit of extra money here will go a long way.

Now, if you have some issues with the outside paint on your fireplace, you don't have to live with that. So, like, for example, I've got this chip right here that I need to take care of. What you want to do is you want to either take the pieces outside that you want to paint or at least mask off everything that you don't want painted. And then just find a high temperature spray paint and spray paint the area that's affected. Now, usually this is like this matte black, high temperature paint so you can find out pretty much anywhere if you want.

They do make other high temperature paints that you can apply, but you might have to order online as like a custom order. So just know you've got some options with that. If you like, you can also spray paint the inside of your fire box. Again, they make some different colors that you can find online. Typically, these will be paints for, like barbecue grills or other high temperature areas, like inside of an engine compartment.

Basically, you just need to look for something that's rated for a high temperature, and I would ideally look for something that's rated for at least 1200 degrees to be able to withstand the heat and the temperature coming off of your fireplace. Certainly, you can paint the mantle as well. If you want it to be a different color, you don't think that you're stuck with a white color. You can absolutely paint it to whatever color you'd like. So if it sticks out, if it doesn't look right in your house, feel free to experiment, see what looks right to you, and change it up.

Now, if you're really looking to dress up your fireplace and change the looks, you can absolutely change the tile around your fireplace, and in some cases you can actually put tile over the existing tile. Just make sure you've got enough of a lip around the existing molding to where the new tile isn't going to stick above that. If it sticks out from the trim, it's not going to look really right. If you're not used to tiling, I wouldn't necessarily recommend you start with a fireplace just because it is the centerpiece in a house.

Everybody's going to be looking at it.

So you might want to practice on another area first. But if you've done tiling jobs before, this is not going to take you very long, and it's going to be really easy because it's a really small area. Now, whatever you do, I highly recommend against using the stick on tile. Now, you might be tempted to do that because it's really easy, especially if you're putting it over the top of a tile. But don't do that because once you turn your fireplace on, it's going to get really hot.

And when it gets really hot, plastic tends to melt. So you might not use your fireplace. But don't think that your kids might not turn it on or a guest might not turn it on. Or when you go to sell your house, the new homeowner might turn it on and then have a huge mess on their hands. So if you're going to do this job, make sure you do it right.

Either remove the tile and replace it with new. Or if you have the option, you might be able to actually tile over the top of the existing tile with a new real tile. Hopefully you found these tips helpful. If you did, don't forget to like this video and subscribe to the Top Homeowner channel. It's our goal to help you become the very best homeowner that you can be.

Thanks for watching and I'll see you in the next one.