@ borvapeople..How about natural light stone cladding over the fireplace and plaster the walls? I covered my brick fireplace in randomly arranged pieces of Ribbinstone. The walls on either side were and still are hoop pine VJ boards. The fireplace was red brick with a dark shellacked timber surround and was what one would term adequate and functional but very dark and was the first thing you saw coming into the room. That was many, nany years ago and everyone then and everyone now has positive remarks. My fireplace was sort of 'stuck' in an otherwise timber wall and contained with the timber surround...it looked "patchy", felt claustrophobic so we extended the Ribbon Stone on heavy fireproof sheeting right up to the 10ft ceiling. The stone pieces were fixed individually and at random with fireproof masonry glue. See what you think. This PIC was taken before I decided to have a log combustion heater inserted in the fireplace (flue goes up the brick chimney) so that I could have the fire going all night....gets very cold here in wimter and this room is adjacent to the main bedroom. Cosy and attractive, gave an entire new ambience to both rooms as I inserted a large fretwork panel in the timber wall between the rooms to allow the heat to flow freely into the bedroom.

Hope this gives other people ideas on what can be done to your house without a lot of cost if you also don't have a lot of money to spend on updating your place.

I love your fireplace, and your tile selection, I can really see those tiles blending beautifully with the rest of the room and being a lovely feature as well. I have a similar fireplace (two tone brown brick) but it's in the living room, so I used furniture to hide it's mouth but will eventually be putting in a gas fireplace. I'd love to see how yours looks once it's done, you've inspired me to consider tiles as a base feature as well! :-)

Hi Georgia, The brick is quite dominant. You could paint out the 2 small side walls to match the rest of the walls in the room. The main fire place you could do the flooring; up to the mantel height you could either leave the brick as is as maybe white wash it to make it less dark, or you can clad it with a tile of stone. Replace the mantle timber wish something that is the full width of the fire place so that it creates a separation point. Paint the brick above the mantle either the same colour as the rest of the room or something complementary. There is always the option of plasterboard so you don't have as much texture visible. Let me know if you need more help. MKG