Flat screen TV mounted above fireplace - yay or nay?

[Anonymous]

OP here. Can't believe how such an innocuous question can generate such snotty comments. Not all of us have a finished basement, seperate living room and family room, etc, etc...and yep - we are solidly middle class (though what that means in the dc metro area is a mystery to me) and the people that will be visiting us in our home wouldn't judge us on such a superficial thing.

[Anonymous]

Candice Olsen mounted a big TV over the fireplace of a newly weds living room in a recent Divine Design episode. looked great. so there's the answer for you from a seasoned professional.

[Anonymous]

I know somebody who created a home theater downstairs in their multiple millions of dollars house to avoid this kind of thing. Guess what? Because it is the basement, their 70" or whatever TV goes unwatched. They watch all their stuff on the old 27" tube TV they have in their master.

At least ours gets watched even though it's - gasp - over the fireplace in our family room on the main floor. My poor kids will no doubt be scarred for life that they had such low class and design-deficient parents. Somehow, I think they will manage to recover.

[Anonymous]

i could never understand the logic of putting a tv screen above a fireplace, in those decorator photos of homes that have been renovated. Don't they ever turn on the fireplace?

Whether I turn on the fireplace once a year or 100 times, I would NOT put a $2K+ screen above something that generated the accumulated heat of a furnace.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
"we just bought a house and the renovation that was done (by the contractor / seller) has the cable wire leading to right above the fireplace. They clearly though that was the obvious place for it. "

So what?

Why be so rude? The contractor put it there, in other words, it seems like the obvious place to two seperate sets of people (DH and me, contractor, etc). We have only three walls in our living room, one is all windows, one is fireplace, the other is the only one a couch can go on. There is open space between living room and dining room. The rest of you care WAY too much about where other people place their televisisions. Please go outside and get a life before you completely lose your perspective on what's worth being rude over!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
"we just bought a house and the renovation that was done (by the contractor / seller) has the cable wire leading to right above the fireplace. They clearly though that was the obvious place for it. "

So what?

Why be so rude? The contractor put it there, in other words, it seems like the obvious place to two seperate sets of people (DH and me, contractor, etc). We have only three walls in our living room, one is all windows, one is fireplace, the other is the only one a couch can go on. There is open space between living room and dining room. The rest of you care WAY too much about where other people place their televisisions. Please go outside and get a life before you completely lose your perspective on what's worth being rude over!

The OP asked for "yea or nay" votes (or "yay" as some would have it). Sorry if you don't like the "nay" votes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
"we just bought a house and the renovation that was done (by the contractor / seller) has the cable wire leading to right above the fireplace. They clearly though that was the obvious place for it. "

So what?

Why be so rude? The contractor put it there, in other words, it seems like the obvious place to two seperate sets of people (DH and me, contractor, etc). We have only three walls in our living room, one is all windows, one is fireplace, the other is the only one a couch can go on. There is open space between living room and dining room. The rest of you care WAY too much about where other people place their televisisions. Please go outside and get a life before you completely lose your perspective on what's worth being rude over!

The OP asked for "yea or nay" votes (or "yay" as some would have it). Sorry if you don't like the "nay" votes.

Its one thing to say "nay" and then explain your position. It's another thing to be rude and judgmental about where others put it -- I find it pretty hilarious (and sadly, pathetic) how strongly some of you feel about where OTHER people put their tv's. Get a life!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
"we just bought a house and the renovation that was done (by the contractor / seller) has the cable wire leading to right above the fireplace. They clearly though that was the obvious place for it. "

So what?

Why be so rude? The contractor put it there, in other words, it seems like the obvious place to two seperate sets of people (DH and me, contractor, etc). We have only three walls in our living room, one is all windows, one is fireplace, the other is the only one a couch can go on. There is open space between living room and dining room. The rest of you care WAY too much about where other people place their televisisions. Please go outside and get a life before you completely lose your perspective on what's worth being rude over!

The OP asked for "yea or nay" votes (or "yay" as some would have it). Sorry if you don't like the "nay" votes.

Its one thing to say "nay" and then explain your position. It's another thing to be rude and judgmental about where others put it -- I find it pretty hilarious (and sadly, pathetic) how strongly some of you feel about where OTHER people put their tv's. Get a life!

But you don't find it pathetic to earnestly defend having a TV at the center of your home, as the focal point of your homelife? Irreconcilable differences, I guess.

My "nay" is simple. We have a fireplace mantel that was constructed to have a flatscreen TV hanging over it. It's in the living room, in full view of the kitchen. In our conceptualization of home, the hearth (fireplace) and kitchen are the heart of the home. The focal point of our home, or the heart of our home, should not be the TV. It's simple to us. The TV is in the basement playroom. You can design your home so your focus is on the literal hearth and the heart of the house -- the kitchen -- or so the focus is on the TV. The decision will have a significant impact on your family life. So while I wouldn't use "pathetic" as the adjective, I'd argue that it's sad to have a TV as the focus of your home life. Perhaps the OP didn't actually want to ask "yea or nay." But if she did, here's a "nay" with a reason behind it.

[Anonymous]

Well, I didn't earnestly defend my decision to put my TV above the fireplace. I do not have another room for the television to go in, and I guess I don't get that into symbolism -- the hearth and heart of the home are my family, wherever we are, not a room or a fireplace (whether it has a television above it or not).

Don't get me wrong, I hear you and I agree that some people almost worship or celebrate the teevee. I'm not one of them; in fact the teevee is on in our home maybe an hour or so each day tops (and that's because DH watches after I fall asleep or while I'm in bed reading -- I'm the poster who never had a television of my own until I started dating DH). Soooo I'm not really over-sensitive to what people think about me. Nor am I calling YOU pathetic for your nay vote or symbolism. I just don't share the concern and don't assign that kind of symbolism to where my television is. Anyway, my objection wasn't to people saying "nay," it's just that there were a few PPs who went off about this like it's a cardinal sin to have the television in the living room and that people who do this are "ghetto" or "low class," etc. Yes, maybe so! I wish I had another home where I could devote one room to "living" and another to our occasional "watching" but I don't. I also don't feel the need to wage war on the placement of someone else's television for any reason at all, mainly I guess because I just don't feel my family has any issues with occasional television nor are we in danger of making it a focal point of our lives by any stretch.

Happy watching, or not watching!

[Anonymous]

This thread is awesome.

[Anonymous]

I'm a real estate agent and attend home inspections all the time. Inspectors always say that from purely a practical standpoint, it's often not good for the screen (as one of the early posters mentioned) to mount it directly on the fireplace, unless you never plan to use it. If you do, it's best to have a mount that is set out a little from the fireplace so the heat from the chimney doesn't ruin your screen (or get an arm that can push the TV out a bit when you light a fire). Additionally, it should truly be professionally installed if you put it there, because you can also damage the flue of the chimney if you don't know what you're doing, and you really don't want that.

[Anonymous]

If the heat from your fireplace/chimney can be felt on the wall above the mantel with your hand, regardless of what is hanging there, you have a crappy fireplace or chimney and it does not draw correctly. You have much bigger problems than whether your TV should be hanging there.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If the heat from your fireplace/chimney can be felt on the wall above the mantel with your hand, regardless of what is hanging there, you have a crappy fireplace or chimney and it does not draw correctly. You have much bigger problems than whether your TV should be hanging there.

exactly.

[Anonymous]

Our house is small (living room & dining room basically one room- no separate family room or finished basement). The only place to put the tv was over the fireplace & we are happy with the arrangement. It is the only tv we have. It fit on the mantel though so we didn't have to hang it.

[Anonymous]

" the people that will be visiting us in our home wouldn't judge us on such a superficial thing. "

If it is such a superficial thing, why are people voting on it?