My wife and I bought our current home in July of 2013. When we moved in there was a Breckwell pellet stove insert. I used it long enough to burn 1 ton of pellet's then I removed and sold it. In our old house we burned wood in a Jotul Oslo so we ended up with a 550 Rockland. We painted the room this past year and stone veneered over the brick with a bluestone hearth and mantle.
looks PHENOMINAL! It's amazing how much character stone can bring to the hearth area. Hands-down the best looking IMO....
Thanks everybody. Just to be clear, I didn't do the stonework myself. I have many talents but thats not one of them. The stone mason who did the work is great and if anyone in my area wants his name PM me. Scotty Overkill, I saw you hearth in another thread and I must say I was impressed. Then I was really impressed when I saw the pic of you and the Mrs in front of it and I realized how grand it really is. Awesome work.
Well, yes and no. First off, I burned wood in my previous house and because of that I had several cords of wood still on hand after I moved (stored at in-laws). Secondly, I prefer burning wood. I already owned saws, splitter, and all the other wood gathering gear so buying pellet's seemed counterproductive. Lastly, the pellet stove was just plain fugly. I went through a ton of pellet's before christmas and I just couldn't justify buying another ton. So the pellet stove was sold on craigslist and the wood stove went in. No regrets.
