DIY Faux Mantel Shelf Install

Does any­one else suf­fer from fire­place envy? I des­per­ately wanted a fire­place in our new house. But, here in the deserts of Ari­zona, they’re a lit­tle harder to come by than in other parts of the coun­try. The house we found (and ulti­mately moved into) was per­fect in many ways, but it was lack­ing a fire­place. This poses such a dec­o­rat­ing dilemma, espe­cially around the hol­i­days! No stock­ings hung by the chim­ney with care. No safe place (i.e out of the reach of lit­tle boys’ hands) to dis­play break­able items! So, we finally cre­ated a solu­tion to our fireplace-less home and made over our din­ing room/living room area a lit­tle by installing our own “faux” man­tel shelf! It’s fairly “plain-Jane” on it’s own, but I LOVE it dressed up! The room it’s in is quite large, with giant vaulted ceil­ings. So, our new faux man­tel helps fill some of the space bet­ter. We still need more decor in that room (and, well, quite frankly fur­ni­ture that goes together & matches). But, the man­tel is at least a step in the right direc­tion! (Look at how sad & lonely that pic­ture looked on the wall by itself before! Yikes!)

We got all the mate­ri­als for our faux man­tel install at Lowe’s. It all started while I was brows­ing in the dec­o­ra­tive mod­el­ing aisle. I had some other project plans in mind. But then, I stum­bled upon a whole fire­place kit section–complete with man­tels, fire­place sur­rounds, cor­bels, etc. They had an unfin­ished 6ft. man­tel for $78. So, we then got some corbels/shelf brack­ets, picked out a large mir­ror, and got some red mahogany stain to match our din­ing room set as closely as possible.

Now, on to the work. First off, if you are going to be using softer/lower qual­ity wood (hence the $78, not $150+), I def­i­nitely rec­om­mend using a wood conditioner/pre-stain before apply­ing the stain. It will help the over­all appear­ance when you apply the stain. Even with the wood con­di­tioner, a more expen­sive wood cer­tainly would look much nicer. But, this works fine for us and the price tag is right. If you’re wor­ried about how the wood is going to absorb the stain, you could always just paint instead.

In addi­tion to pre-treating the wood, we also made sure to sand the man­tel well before apply­ing the stain. Then, we spent time stain­ing. And, once that was dry, we did a coat of polyurethane (satin fin­ish). We did the same process on the shelf brack­ets as well.

Once that all was dry and look­ing the way we wanted, we moved on to installing it. First up, we had to mount a cleat to the wall. This is what the man­tel attaches to for added sup­port (the man­tel is hol­low in back). Then, we attached the man­tel shelf to the shelf brack­ets and installed that on the wall. The shelf brack­ets go into the wall with large dry wall anchor screws. And, then, you nail the man­tel shelf to the cleat, so every­thing is nice & sturdy!

Once the shelf is up, we hung the mir­ror. I love how it helps take up some of the ver­ti­cal space on the wall. It’s a dark wood also (even though I know it looks black in the pic­tures). Again, the two look fairly plain on their own, but I don’t think the man­tel will ever sit just empty again! The only thing left to do then is dec­o­rate! And, since Hal­loween is this week, the man­tel got spook­i­fied! It is SO nice to have a place to set break­able items that the boys can’t get to! Even though I had dis­played my new apothe­cary jars on the back of the piano before, I had to move every­thing for fear of the boys break­ing it.  But, not any­more!

I can’t wait to dec­o­rate it for the rest of the seasons/holidays! So fun! And, now I’m eager to get some bet­ter wall dec­o­rat­ing going in the rest of our liv­ing room/dining room area!

Do YOU have a fire­place or “faux” mantel?

Inter­ested in win­ning $100 to Lowe’s…then, head on over to this month’s give­away (ends tomor­row night 10/30). For even more ideas, visit Lowes Cre­ative Ideas. While you’re there, you can sign up to receive their free Cre­ative Ideas Mag­a­zine, which is full of all kinds of ideas & inspiration!

Dis­clo­sure:  I am a mem­ber of the Lowe’s Cre­ative Ideas Cre­ators & Influ­encers Net­work and received a Lowe’s gift card to com­plete my projects. As always, all opin­ions and expe­ri­ences are my own.