Building Fireplace Mantels [Paperback]

Mario Rodriguez (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 1, 2002

The attractive and distinctive fireplace mantels in this book will inspire homeowners to undertake one of the most popular renovation projects in the home. Step-by-step instructions, cutlists and excellent process photography and illustrations will make this book appeal to woodworkers with varying degrees of expertise.

Product Details

• Paperback: 160 pages
• Publisher: Taunton Press (October 1, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1561583855
• ISBN-13: 978-1561583850
• Product Dimensions: 10.9 x 9 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 2.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #200,934 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

76 of 80 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Outstanding Book on Focused Topic, December 7, 2002

By 

Thomas W. Snook "admiralty" (Coral Gables, FL USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Building Fireplace Mantels (Paperback)

This is an outstanding book on a focused topic: "Distinctive [Fireplace] Projects for any Style Home." After discussing some basics of mantel making, he describes in detail from start to finish, step-by-step, including a materials list, suppliers, and tools needed for nine projects to build nine different style firelplace mantels: Simple Colonial, Georgian, Simple Federal, Arts and Crafts, Mackintosh, Victorian, Greene and Greene, Art Deco, and Contemporary. We are updating a fifty-year old home in Coral Gables, Florida. It presently has a very pedestrian fireplace mantel. I wanted a fireplace mantel with more style. My wife and I both loved the Art Deco mantel in the book and I plan to build it almost exactly as described. I should save a considerable amount of money on materials because the mantel is built basically from one sheet of mahogany plywood. The color photographs are also outstanding in clarity and detail.

16 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars You will be frustrated if you try to build using this book, June 1, 2008

By 

B. Rutledge "sjsdad" (Las Vegas, NV USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Building Fireplace Mantels (Paperback)

The book looks nice, and when you first read through the book it APPEARS to be a book you can use to build a mantel. Before I built my mantel I would have given it 4 or 5 stars (like the other people who rated it that have yet to try and build with it), but after building my mantel I wish I could give it less than one star. There are diagrams, but they omit crucial measurements and steps. There are instructions, but once you start to build you realize they are insanely vague at points, and omit crucial steps. The measurements in the text sometimes conflict with the measurements in the diagrams, and both sometimes conflict with reality. The book is OK to get ideas, and you could take a chance and hope the mantle you pick has decent instructions (I didn't build them all), but you will likely just get frustrated - there are much better books out there. Fortunately I am an experienced finish carpenter and was able to make the mantel I wanted DESPITE the book's errors and omissions - but keep in mind this is the first one-star review I have given a woodworking book (and I own hundreds).

5 of 7 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Building Fireplace Mantels, August 29, 2005

By 

James H. Schell "Wood Butcher" (Flower Mound, TX USA) - See all my reviews
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Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Building Fireplace Mantels (Paperback)

Excellent for the beginner to the advanced woodworker. Covers framing considerations well, as well as atachment schemes and fasteners.