It builds a room
More than any other fire feature, a fireplace defines and encloses outdoor space.
Outdoor Fireplaces
An enclosed firebox with a chimney, built the way a fireplace is built into a house: the feature that turns a patio into a room.
What It Is
What is an outdoor fireplace?
A vertical structure with an enclosed firebox and a chimney, built into the backyard the way a fireplace is built into a house. The fire sits inside a chamber and throws its heat forward, so everyone faces the same direction. Where a fire pit gives you a campfire, a fireplace gives you a theater: seating in an arc, the fire as the backdrop, and a wall of masonry behind it that anchors that end of the yard whether or not anything is burning.
A fireplace suits a backyard that wants a room rather than a feature. Its mass does real architectural work: terminating a sightline, screening a neighbor, dividing lounge from dining, or giving a covered patio a back wall. Faced in stone or brick matching the house, it reads as part of the building.
It is also the fire feature that works best in bad conditions. The chimney carries smoke up and away whichever way the wind blows, and an enclosed firebox lights easily on evenings when an open pit is a struggle. It can be the wrong pick in a small yard, where the height and mass feel overbearing and block a view you would rather keep.
Timber textured fireplace by concrete commander
Unlit · mass and facing 
Screened lanai · Laughlin
Your options.
Construction
Full masonry built on site, or a prefabricated firebox with a masonry surround. Masonry is fully custom and takes weeks. Prefab shortens the build substantially and still finishes in stone or brick.
Fuel
Wood-burning or gas. Wood gives crackle, smell, and real radiant heat. Gas gives instant on, no ash, no wood storage, and no smoke to manage.
Size
Anywhere from roughly 3 feet wide and 4 feet tall up to genuinely monumental. Proportion to the yard matters more than absolute size. A fireplace scaled to a large property will overwhelm a small one.
Facing
Natural stone, brick, stucco over block, or tile. The most visible decision. Matching the house makes it architecture; contrasting makes it a feature.
Extras
Mantel, raised hearth, flanking seat walls, wood storage, a built-in television, a pizza oven. These are what turn a fireplace into an outdoor room. Decide early, most have to be built in rather than added.
Why a fireplace.
Smoke goes up, not at you
A drafting chimney solves the problem that makes fire pits unpleasant on the wrong evening.
Concentrated warmth
Heat comes forward at the seating instead of dissipating in every direction.
It works as architecture
Faced to match the house, it looks like it was always there.
FAQs
The six questions we hear most about outdoor fireplaces.
Is an outdoor fireplace better than a fire pit?
Neither is better, they gather people differently. A fireplace seats everyone facing one direction and concentrates heat forward. A fire pit puts everyone in a circle. Choose the social shape you want.
Do I need a permit for an outdoor fireplace?
Usually, and more often than for a fire pit. It is a permanent structure with a foundation and a flue, so requirements are real and vary by location. Ask before you design around one.
Can I have an outdoor fireplace on a covered patio?
Often yes, and the chimney is exactly why it works there. Clearances and flue routing under a roof are stricter, so treat it as a design-stage question rather than an assumption.
What happens if it smokes into the seating area?
Chimney height is where wood-burning fireplaces go wrong. Too short relative to the house, a pergola or a roofline and it drafts badly, pushing smoke back down on the wrong wind. The good news is that this is testable, and a chimney can be extended after the fireplace is built and burned without tearing anything down.
How much maintenance does it need?
Very little. Masonry does not need maintenance in any meaningful sense. A wood-burning firebox wants its chimney checked and cleaned periodically; a gas unit wants an annual look at the burner.
What should I ask any builder?
Three things. How is chimney height being determined, and will we test the draft before you leave? Is this a prefab firebox or full masonry? And what is the foundation, and does this need a permit here?
Other Fire Features
Compare all four
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