An open fire can be a real work of art a focal point for a modern living space. Contemporary fireplaces act as more than the frame for that piece of art the materials you choose to use, and the way that you decide to showcase the flames, becomes an integral part of a living, breathing, warming sculpture.
Fire baskets are often used to bring focus to a fireplace, and to make sure that the fire itself is contained and easy to manage. Originally the purpose of a fire basket was to raise the fire off the hearth stone, so it got a better flow of oxygen these days contemporary fireplaces use fire baskets as much for effect as for their assistance in keeping flames going.
This is most epitomised by the stone bowl, which of course has no accessible underside but which provides both protection for the floor of your contemporary fireplace and for people near it. The bowl contains the fire perfectly, ensuring that you get no pieces of burning wood or coal dislodge and fall through the grate to cause problems in the hearth. It also looks spectacular.
The choice of material you make for your contemporary fireplaces, and for the
fire baskets you use in them, can dictate the feel of your whole room. In precisely the same way that a commanding picture orders the room around it, a contemporary fireplace in, say, bronze, sets the tone for the decoration and dialect of everything else.
Choose classic material and designs in a contemporary room and you make a very definite statement in which your contemporary fireplaces denote that you are updating an established architectural idea of luxury. Choose modern materials (stone is again an excellent example) and you expressly align yourself with a rejection of classical ideals on other words, your fire baskets in this case tell the occupants of your room that they are in a house that takes its design themes from places other than the linear progression of architectural orders that most upscale British homes are based on.
Contemporary fireplaces dont even have to be fireplaces in the strictest sense of the word. Some of the most stunning examples incorporate wood burning stoves, which add an energy efficient element to the proceedings (you can even specify wood burning stoves that burn their own exhaust gases for superb environmental performance) and dont even have to be set in traditional fireplace spaces at all. The most contemporary fireplaces of all are set in glass fronted cavities in the walls of your room, making the whole living space a wonderful kind of mixture of futurism and cave dwelling.
From classic fire baskets and the most traditional of contemporary fireplaces (traditional styles, modern materials) all the way through to the glass fronted fire in the wall, theres a living work of art for every modern home. Question is, which one is right for you?
