fall fireplace decorating

Fall fireplace decorating

Disclosure: Some of the links below are affiliate links, meaning at no additional cost to you, I may earn a commission if you click through and make a purchase. 

A trifecta of florals and pumpkins on the mantel, pillows and greenery, and blankets all tie together

I love fall. I live in New England, so fall can be a glorious season filled with summer heat turning into cool September nights, time spent at the apple orchard picking the perfect apples, pumpkins, and homemade donuts, spectacular colors in the trees, among so many other things.  

I love changing out my summer pillow covers for something with a fall theme, busting out my warm throw blankets for cool nights with the windows open, remaking the bed with my warmer winter linens,  and giving my mantle a fall makeover.

A couple of things to think about while making over your mantle: 

Halloween 

If  you’re like me, you’ll be decorating for Halloween as soon as you hit October, then you’ll be back to fall decor for the rest of November through Thanksgiving. So you’ll want to keep it simple and non-permanent so you are making a Herculean effort every time you decide to change decor. Who has time for that? Not me. 

Style 

Is your home style modern? Rustic? Industrial? Farmhouse? Don’t say transitional, because that’s a bullshit fallback for decorators when their client doesn’t know what style they are, or they’ve mixed too many styles. Look on Pinterest or Houzz or Google “fall mantle decor” and lots of pictures will pop up. Save the ones you like. That’s your style.

Color Scheme

Gone are the days of red, orange, and yellow as the “musts” for fall decor. If you love those colors, and they fit in your home scheme, great! For me, I don’t want to change out all my furniture and pillows for every holiday and season, so I try to blend what I have with the current color scheme I love. In this case, yellows and blues. Overall, just try to stick to two to three main colors in your entire scheme and try to tie it together in different elements at different areas on the fireplace mantle and hearth. More on this in my design below. 

Asymmetry or Symmetry 

When you look at mantle style you love, are you seeing yourself lean towards asymmetrical or symmetrical styling? There’s no right or wrong here. It’s all your preference. For symmetrical styling, you’ll basically need two of each object to get an even effect, which can impact your budget if you need to buy things to supplement what you already have. Symmetry looks more formal, so if you have a very formal living room, this will go perfectly!

I love asymmetry on my fireplace mantle, which allows me to add quirky, eclectic pieces to my mantle. You can see in the current picture of my fireplace that I have added both height and layers on my fireplace, but that there are different objects on each side. 

Our fireplace over the summer has lots of houseplants collected over the pandemic and a few that have been with me for years.

Current Mantel

My style is industrial modern. My house, however, is more rustic industrial with its brick fireplace and recycled materials. I’ve done a major upgrade to the fireplace, which you can read more about here that includes painting the brick and the inside of the firebox and replacing the outdated mantle with a beautiful recycled, wood beam we picked up at a local antique store. With the fireplace makeover, it’s leaning more towards industrial glam, with my big, gorgeous gold octagon mirror above it. So to stick with that style, I don’t go all farmhouse or country decor on it. I stick with the style it is, by adding a bit of seasonal glam.

Budget

$5,99 before 60% of at Joann Fabrics!

Pretty neutral foliage to compliment my glam pumpkins

I didn’t want to spend a lot on this project. Why? Because we just got back from a big vacation after waiting years due to the pandemic. Also, our house has no storage. One day I’ll do a post about the shed going into the side yard. Until that day, we have no storage, so the last thing I want is more stuff to pack into overstuffed totes in the overstuffed garage. I was able to go to Joann Fabrics and grab these great faux foliage pieces which matched perfectly with the other pieces I’ve had for years. They were having a 60% sale, so I got all 5 pieces for under $12. Bonus is they’ll be easy to store after the season is over

The Finished Design

I actually sketched my mantle out first - yes, I’m a giant dork, but for me it was strategic. Since I use a wheelchair and the logistics of the fireplace make it hard for me to reach, I wanted to think this through before I started putting objects done and then have to move them an insufferable number of times. Yes, my hubby would have helped me, but you know when you want to do something yourself? Well, this was the reason. 

The finished product with all the colors pulled throughout the design.

To add height, I used te books I already had on the mantle, but flipped them backwards so the paper was showing, not the bindings. I used the candle holders  I had refinished last year by putting the medium-sized on the books. The small and large candle holders are placed on the opposite end for balance (not symmetry). I even left the candles the same because I have blue velvet pumpkins and blue in my fall pillows to tie everything together. I also used the yellow throw blanket I have out all season to pull everything together. It’s from a local store and one of a kind, so no link for this. The plant on the hearth is there all year and too heavy to move. Luckily it matches beautifully with everything else. 

The pillow covers are from Amazon. The yellow cover  I have out all year except at Christmas. The “Autumn” cover is also from Amazon. 

For these adorable velvet pumpkins, the closest I could find is on Amazon since I believe they were a gift to me years ago. 

The basket is from Target and is as useful in this situation as it is for holding papers in the office or other sundries in the kitchen. 

The other random pumpkins probably came from Micahels at one time or another. So you see, I only had to buy the faux foliage and I didn’t have to change out my whole living room decor to give it a nice, cozy fall makeover.