Hi,
I've recently bought a Victorian terraced house and have been in the process of doing some minor renovations, In the back room the chimney breast was plastered over leaving just a blank wall. I've decided to open this up, just a a feature, no fire will be going in its place.
I've started to remove the plaster and was expecting to find either a fire place of some sort or a void behind the plaster where a fire would have once sat. The plan is depending what was there to either clean up the brickwork if in a good enough condition or plaster and paint it.
However, this doesn't look as straight forward on first impressions. There seems to be a old fire of some description but like nothing I've ever seen. There seems to be a cast iron (?) tank at the bottom and some brickwork that angles out with another piece of iron on top which is then piled high with soot. I also don't see any signs of a lintel or brick arch, which makes me wonder what is taking the weight. Would this have this been some sort of back boiler, there are pipes in the cupboards built into the chimney breast that look like they could be from an old back boiler but these may be remains of something else.
This may also explain why there was some slight damp at the bottom corners of the chimney breast. There was a vent but due to the way the bricks angle out, I don't think this would have been sufficient for it to breathe. Could also have been due to the chimney stack which was in a poor state. This has since been dropped by a foot, re pointed and cowls put back in place.
I've recently bought a Victorian terraced house and have been in the process of doing some minor renovations, In the back room the chimney breast was plastered over leaving just a blank wall. I've decided to open this up, just a a feature, no fire will be going in its place.
I've started to remove the plaster and was expecting to find either a fire place of some sort or a void behind the plaster where a fire would have once sat. The plan is depending what was there to either clean up the brickwork if in a good enough condition or plaster and paint it.
However, this doesn't look as straight forward on first impressions. There seems to be a old fire of some description but like nothing I've ever seen. There seems to be a cast iron (?) tank at the bottom and some brickwork that angles out with another piece of iron on top which is then piled high with soot. I also don't see any signs of a lintel or brick arch, which makes me wonder what is taking the weight. Would this have this been some sort of back boiler, there are pipes in the cupboards built into the chimney breast that look like they could be from an old back boiler but these may be remains of something else.
This may also explain why there was some slight damp at the bottom corners of the chimney breast. There was a vent but due to the way the bricks angle out, I don't think this would have been sufficient for it to breathe. Could also have been due to the chimney stack which was in a poor state. This has since been dropped by a foot, re pointed and cowls put back in place.
