How to decorate your home with Firewood

Flick through the pages of any self-respecting interior design magazine, or search up home decorating ideas through Instagram or Pinterest and we can guarantee that you’ll find a gorgeous fireplace accompanied with a generous pile of neatly stacked logs. Wood burning stoves and open fires are very much in vogue as they bring a warm and cosy feel to any home.  Since they require wood, storing your firewood in an equally fashionable way is all part of the attraction.  A focal fireplace complete with decorative fireplace logs brings a real feeling of cosiness to any home and looks super-stylish too.

But is this practical, and how can you bring your own room to life with a log fire decoration?  Here are a few of our top tips that will help you to get it right:

Use kiln dried logs – decorative logs should always be well-dried with a moisture content of under 20%, as should all wood you burn in the home. It is particularly important to use wood that has been kiln dried as part of your log fire decoration because the kiln drying process will have eradicated unwanted pests, bugs and other creepy crawlies that you could otherwise introduce into your home. For this reason, please do not be tempted to bring wood from your garden inside to use as part of your display, even if it has been seasoned in advance.

Cut all firewood to an even length – about 25cms is an ideal length as it is long enough to look great yet will be short enough to fit into your grate or log burner. Ensure all your decorative logs are cut cleanly and evenly to a uniform length. Your firewood decoration can contain logs of different widths.

Use a variety of logs – mixed hardwood is ideal to display as a medley of different woods with varying thickness and hues of colour will add texture and interest to your display.

Stack your wood within an alcove or basket near to your fireplace – although you’ll see some homes with firewood stacked in the inglenook next to a wood burning stove this is not sensible from a fire safety point of view. The Fire and Rescue Service strongly advises people not to stack logs – or for that matter any other combustible materials, next a stove or open fire.  Storing logs against the hot external surface of a wood burner is a common cause of house fires.

It doesn’t matter if you don’t have a stove – many people simply stack firewood as wood log decoration into an unused feature fireplace or alcove and it looks great! Feature firewood walls are also very much on trend.

Add some fairy lights – a string of tasteful fairy lights will add a beautiful twinkle to your decorative log display.

Store in a fireside basket – a simple wicker basket or attractive metal bucket containing logs provides an easy to achieve, yet attractive way to decorate your fireplace. This is especially  practical for those of us with limited space to create a decorative log feature. It looks appealing, is easy to keep clean and provides a practical way to ensure you have firewood at hand. We hope this blog has inspired you to decorate your home with firewood and we’re always keen to see your real-life decorative log features and fireplaces. Why not share your photos, top tips and ideas directly to our Facebook page?