Need Help Choosing Zero Clearance Fireplace

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Les7500

New Member
Jun 20, 2025
2
Boston, MA
I am rebuilding my post-and-beam home (it burned down), and I am going to replace what was a masonry wood fireplace with a ZC wood-burning unit.

It is becoming one of the most difficult choices in the rebuild!

What I had been hoping for was something rectangular in shape, and very modern-looking (see inspiration photo), with the ability to provide auxiliary heating.

The Stuv 21-85 ticked all the boxes for me as it was very modern, had heat recovery, and a guillotine door (I will not do a single side swing door). and could accept a gas log if I chose to later. I was ready to pull the trigger on that until I saw the warranty and some concerning posts about reliability online.

I guess my second choice is the Renaissance Uptown 600?

It seems if I want the ability to control the burn or have a fire much beyond decorative, I have to consider some double arched door style fireplaces such as the Majestic MarmMajic II, or the Heatilator Constitution. This is a pretty large departure from the look I was hoping for.

I did have one fireplace retailer say that something like the latter two (specifically the FP Xtrordinair Elite 36) would be far too overpowered for my house, and blow me out of the room.

The house is going to be about 1350sf, and you can see the area where the fireplace is going to be installed in the attached images.

Thank you in advance for any advice!!
 

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Sorry to hear about the fire. The FPX guy is right. This will not require a lot of heat. Stick to about 2 cu ft sized fireplace. It will probably have a swinging door. The Valcourt Mundo II, RSF Focus 3600, and Pacific Energy FP 16 or FP25 come to mind.
 
Sorry to hear about the fire. The FPX guy is right. This will not require a lot of heat. Stick to about 2 cu ft sized fireplace. It will probably have a swinging door. The Valcourt Mundo II, RSF Focus 3600, and Pacific Energy FP 16 or FP25 come to mind.

Sorry to hear about the fire. The FPX guy is right. This will not require a lot of heat. Stick to about 2 cu ft sized fireplace. It will probably have a swinging door. The Valcourt Mundo II, RSF Focus 3600, and Pacific Energy FP 16 or FP25 come to mind.
These are all great suggestions . . . the killer for me is that single swinging door. If we had not been so stuck on avoiding that feature, this would not be such a tough choice!
 
The Osburn Stratford 2 is a double door and has a removable grille door for ambiance fires (single door). It may be a bit bigger than you need though. There are a couple of face trim options.
[Hearth.com] Need Help Choosing Zero Clearance Fireplace