Fireplace dilemma: Wooden or electric, which one to choose?

Thinking of getting a fireplace this winter? While the traditional wooden fireplace is a tribute to nostalgia and old-school romanticism, the modern electric fireplace is no less. Here’s a quick check on the pros and cons of both and what might actually work well in your house.

How to choose the perfect fireplace for your house?  

Traditional wooden fireplace

What you can experience is the manual loading of wood into the fireplace, which is then ignited. Once the fire is burning, you will be able to get the charred smell of burnt logs. These fireplaces are usually present in old colonial mansions or decor that resembles them.

The advantage? These mansions have larger rooms, and a wooden fireplace is perfect for heating up large spaces. However, installing an authentic and traditional fireplace might be difficult and require adjustments to your existing room infrastructure, especially regarding finding a way for the vent. At times, heat can also escape from the vent, as it is an open outlet. It may not be suitable for those who have breathing problems, simply because of the amount of soot and charcoal dust that escapes around in the air. Lastly, a wooden fireplace has many integral components which need to be maintained perfectly for it to function smoothly.  

Electric fireplace

For electric fireplaces, just read through the instruction manual, and you can install it in a jiffy. Moreover, since it doesn’t need real wood, the byproducts like soot or ash are also less. This makes it a safer option, especially if you have children or older people around. An electric fireplace has several designs that you can choose from and even at times customise it with the look and requirements of your room and space. However, the heat output is lower than a wooden fireplace. An electric fireplace, as the name suggests, is dependent on electricity, so if there is a power outage during storms or snowfall, there would be no functioning fireplace.

What to consider before getting a new fireplace?

Thus, when you choose a fireplace, make a checklist. Do you have a chimney which can be restructured as a wooden fireplace vent? How large is the space that you actually want the fireplace to heat? Are there children, senior citizens and pets living with you? Do you get power outages often? Do you have the time and patience to maintain a traditional fireplace? Are there members in the family suffering from pulmonary distress? How much does fuel and energy cost, and to what extent might the charges rise?

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