Fireplaces first appeared in houses for purely functional reasons: they offered a safe place to cook meals and provide heat. Because of the importance of those two functions, and the size of early fireplaces, they also became domestic focal points. In time, people started adding decorative touches to the area around the fireplace. They put up shelves and then added simple trim to cover the gap between the wall and the edge of the firebox. Before long, these simple additions developed into complex and elaborate mantles inspired by Greek and Roman temples, baroque and Victorian ornamentation and more contemporary arts and crafts styles. Fireplaces evolved from functional to architectural focal points.

In this episode of Trading Spaces, both sets of homeowners expressed an urgent desire to have something done with their very plain fireplaces. Their houses, like those of their other neighbors, had been built by the same contractor, and all of them had simple fireplace surrounds, with nondescript tile borders and a small shelf. The challenge for the designers, and for carpenter Ty, was to create a mantle in each house that managed to showcase the fireplace, turning it into a true focal point in the room. With contemporary house styles such as these, those traditional mantle styles can look completely out of place. Rather than search for historic precedents, Gen and Doug picked up clues from the existing houses to help shape their designs. This project description will not discuss in detail each of the mantles they designed, so much as it will try to synthesize the two different approaches and offer some general guidelines on how you might build your own.

Building a relatively simple mantle is not a tough task for most do-it-yourselfers. But more elaborate designs are, as Ty expressed it, "a lot of work." Before you start planning your own mantle, you might want to shop around to see what is available in manufactured mantles. There are many styles available these days, in sizes that will fit most of the fireplaces in newer homes. One properly sized kit will contain all of the parts you need along with detailed assembly and installation instructions, and you may be able to find exactly what you want.