Hi Cathy, yes floors look just as good.... we did them in December 2013. When floors were brown.. wood coloured they showed a bit of wear (dog scratches), on the white you don't see the scratches... the white floors still look fresh... the beauty of the painted floors is that if you get heavy wear in certain areas, you can just repaint the floor!!! (ie no sanding... this is a big deal). If you decide to go ahead, I would love to see your before and after photos. Thanks. Following is how my husband did the floors: We are in Sydney, Australia... unsure if the following are international brands? My husband used Feast & Watson Floor Paint in White Satin (water based) and then 2 coats of Intergrain clear finish (also water based... so with sunlight the floors won't yellow if you use water based)

HU, I've replied to old posts, sometimes the related questions that appear can be confusing and the date can be overlooked, it happens, I think many of us have done it, so don't worry about it. Thing is, if the original poster is no longer following and if other people looking for inspo are more likely to get advice by starting a question of their own than getting lost in an old discussion and if people willing to reply waste time reading through before noticing the question is 7 years old, and it brings it back to the first page making it more likely more people will mistake it for a recent discussion, I'm not sure how productive any of that is, so I appreciate the 'old post' advisory, and in that spirit since I've now added to the conversation I'll draw to others' attention that this is an OLD POST

I would leave the render colour and just tile a trim around the base in a pattern and over the arch of the brick. But I also recalled the pizza oven at a pizza place where I grew up. They make great pizza, but the oven is so cool! You could do something like this!

mischiefdebs has good suggestions. I would clean it up but without losing the natural, rugged look. Change the base and platforms. Don't waste it on cats 'though, put potted plants on the platforms. Definitely don't put it in the garden unless you want it to rot away in no time. Don't despair, it has great potential. ;-)