It is a dilemma whether or not to replaster the victorian one and how to treat the opening were we to do so.
We think that when this fireplace and chimney was added the owners lined the hearth of the earliest (16/17th century) one in red brick to match. Of the others, the true victorian one was definitely plastered over until recently although the hearth would always have been open and is in red brick too, as is the smoking (or maybe salt?) shelf at the back of it. The kitchen one which would have contained the range has sadly been knocked down and rebuilt much closer to the wall (with only a fake chimney left) by a previous vandal - oops,sorry - owner. I have 3 victorian or (maybe a little earlier) fireplaces in my house - all of them red brick. It's a little hard to tell at that distance but I wouldn't be so sure that's a facade. More that if it's not possible to start messing with the brickwork, or should it be a repair/replacement for the original fireplace it might go some way to producing something more in-keeping if the brickwork wasn't exposed? When I say plastering, I'm not intending to go down the route of mock fireplace with some fake flowers in it (I'll choose to take that as an alternative sensible suggestion rather than anything else). Particularly given that the same former owner has corbelled the chimney in the kitchen without properly supporting. I guess the next step is to measure the dimensions of the chimney breast upstairs and in the roof and check that downstairs matches - that should give us an idea of the actual/'correct' size? This arrangement has clearly been in place for some time, as the bricks behind the fire are heavily blackened, which is of course not to say that it's period/traditional, but that I suspect caution should be used when investigating not to end up with more than we bargained for. Well, I'm not sure how much is facade, as the chimney functions.
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