Creating a Beautiful Headboard from a Vintage Mantel

{Coastal Living}

I’ve stumbled upon many gorgeous vintage fireplace mantels at antique malls, flea markets, and architectural salvage stores but have left even the most droolworthy of them behind because I had no use for them.  Our fireplace is one of the few things in our home that I would say is officially “done”, as we recently remodeled it with floor to ceiling stacked stone.  After seeing the image of a mantel-turned-headboard on Pinterest, I searched a little further and found image after image of gorgeous headboards created by using vintage mantels – here are my favorites:

{Apartment Therapy}

{Southern Living}

{Traditional Home}

{The Old Painted Cottage}

{A Fanciful Twist}

{Dreamy Whites}

{Gail’s Decorative Touch}

{Blue Creek Home}

Stunning, aren’t they?! And I love the idea of having a mantel above the bed to decorate, especially since the design of our fireplace has left me mantel-less.  Several of the images I found come from DIYers who share their methods of creating the headboards and it seems very doable. Most of them started with a plywood board that was cut just a bit smaller than the mantel opening and they covered it with foam and cotton batting followed by their chosen fabric, using a staple gun to staple the layers to the back.  Adding tufting makes it a bit more time and labor intensive but I think I would give it a shot because I love that look.  I’m pretty sure that the next time I come across a beautiful vintage mantel, I won’t be leaving it behind… How about you?