Whitewashed farmhouse brick. It is everywhere on pinterest friends! I decided to give it a go and thought I’d share our tutorial for anyone who’s looking to take the plunge as well!

When we first moved into this house, I knew I was in for a lot of work with painting and painting and more painting. One of the things that we just loved about this house though was the fireplace. I always pictured a big chunky mantel and I knew this fireplace had more potential. We knew this would be a “someday” project though and not a right now thing. The room looked like this on move-in day:

We did some work to this room, making it our own, and for the last couple of years, this is what it’s looked like:

Fast forward to two and a half years down the road and all the white farmhouse obsessed ideas in my brain (thank you pinterest), and I knew it had to happen.

I started researching online and decided one day to just start painting the brick. This was super scary. I knew once I started there was no going back. I started on the side of the brick, so if it looked awful, I could pretend I never started it. Here’s a little collection of pics from start to finish of this project. I am SO SO happy with how this turned out. If you’re trying to decide weather or not to just do it- I say go for it. Why not? You cannot go wrong with white.

Paint used for this fireplace project was a white chalk paint. I don’t think any particular brand matters. I purchased mine at a local antique barn.

Don’t mind the messy carpet…sometimes flakes of brick or dust and dirt will come off as you’re painting. Vacuum later.

I knew I wanted the lines in between the brick a little bit whiter than the white washed bricks themselves, so I used two consistencies of paint. In between the bricks, the paint was thicker, less water. I used a small paint brush for the lines. This was super tedious. It felt like it took FOREVER to paint in all the lines.

I then went back over the brick with a sponge brush, and chalk paint mixed with a bit more water than what I was using for the lines in between bricks. I sponged the paint on, waited a minute or so, then dabbed it with a sponge or paper towel to remove a small amount of it. This process can totally be your own, depending on how white you’d like your fireplace to turn out.

Here we are was about half way done. This was after cursing ever starting this project because it was taking SO long to finish.

I just knew though I was going to love it at this point. You can see at the bottom of the fireplace near the floor where some were way whiter than others, so I did have to go back and do a little blending. Just pay attention to how it’s drying as you go.

Notice the old mantle, (who are we kidding- It was hardly big enough to be a mantle) shelf is now gone! As I continued to round the corners and paint the other side of the fireplace, Ian began work on some shiplap style walls.

I knew I wanted to do this to give the fireplace a grander look, but I didn’t want to spend a ton. We started weighing our options. For this small space, instead of buying actual tongue and groove boards, we decided to go the cheaper route and use pine boards.

We purchased 4×8 pine boards at home depot. You can find the product here. If you’re thinking- I don’t have tools to cut these to the size I need- here’s  a little secret- Home Depot (or any other major lumber store) will cut them for you! Not even kidding. All you have to do is ask.

Ian first put some strips on the walls to ensure our cords from the TV would be able to run behind the shiplap walls. We wanted to mount the tv above the fireplace and be able to hide them, therefore, we needed to bring the wall out a bit.

Once the wood strips were on the walls, he began adding the pine boards.

Living with the main focus point of our living room like this for a couple of months was a little crazy, but eventually we got it all done and painted, and it was a fantastic day when we could finally say we were finished!

That glorious mantle is a whole other tutorial in itself so I won’t get into it, but can we just give Mr. Ball a pat on the back for that one? That big, beautiful, chunky mantle is EXACTLY what I asked for and I didn’t have to spend $500 online to get it. He sure is handy.

This project was one of those tedious projects that will take forever if it’s football or wedding or practically any other season, however, it was well, well worth it and I’d do it again in a heartbeat! This space is the coziest spot in our home and we all love to snuggle up here and watch movies together! Hope this tutorial was helpful!