Prettying Up the Oven

Spent most of the holidays doing finishing work on the oven. Some functional work, but mostly cosmetic touches on the oven. The main task this time was to fix up the front of the oven to make it look more presentable. Here are the before and after pictures.









On the left is the before - what the front has looked like since I started using the oven for cooking. It is rough and unfinished. On the right is the completed finishing work. I lined the sides with brick tiles and created a arch over the oven entrance in an attempt to soften the look of the oven. I will probably paint over the rough concrete just to get away from the ugly gray finish, too.


These are work in progress pictures, showing the stages of construction before the completed work. Notice the use of wood scaffolding to hold up the arch as the concrete sets.













One other improvement I did on the oven was to put a vent on the top of the chimney. This sends most of the smoke away from the house. It will also help keep the rain out of the oven. The vent is the concrete addition on top of the chimney bricks, it is open on the other side to let the smoke out.



While the oven is more presentable now, there is still more work to be done. Next up on the job list is to put brick tiles on the sides and the front of the oven base. I estimate this will take about two weekends of work to complete. The problem, as always, is finding the time to schedule the work. If I cook, I don't have time to work on it. If I do brick work, I can't cook for a few days while the cement dries up. My preference, of course, is to cook! Then we get to eat pizza!