Fireplace, part three

Okay, I think we have it. Prepare yourself for the ugliest rendering of a fireplace ever.

Ready?

Sad rendering of our cool fireplace vision, done on ...PowerPoint. 

Overall, I'm pretty excited about this idea that Niels threw out there a few days ago. The more I thought about it, the more I realized it's exactly what I/we want. 

The fireplace insert is the Classic Flame 36" 36EB111-GRC, which had already selected.

As we've been looking online and in real life, we keep coming back to this fireplace surround:

We like the concrete look, though we'll likely do a smooth stucco. We like that there is both a mantle and a hearth, and while it is modern, it still seems cozy to us. The more we came back to it, the more the idea of the tile framed around it and up to the ceiling grew on us, too, especially because we have a 14' ceiling.

The natural choice for the tile was this 12"x24" Emser Strands tile in Twilight (or the Daltile Fabrique in Gris, which ever is the better buy), which is what we'll use in the mudroom and foyer, so it will tie all together nicely:

I like Niels' idea of having a stripe for a little visual interest. We have a few ideas. First, we could use a stripe of a different color Emser Strands/Daltile Fabrique tile, similar to what was done in this bathroom.

Source: houzz.com via Jen on Pinterest

In the same vein, Emser, but not Daltile, has mosaics with both matchstick and squares, like this:

matchstick

mosaic

Another option, since the great room is open to the kitchen, is to use a stripe of our very cool Solistone Mardi Gras in Carrollton:

Carrollton close up

Carrollton in context.

My initial preference is with the Carrollton, but since we don't have tile samples, it's hard to know which will look best...yet.