Striped masonry stove transforms living room—the Candy Stove was painted in just 8 hours for 70 euros

What they wanted

Everything in this home is colorful and a bit unique. Therefore, the stove also received an eye-catching striped pattern. When Heidi Kuuliala and Väinö Pitkäniitty’s family of five caught COVID-19, Heidi became bored during quarantine. She had developed a liking for stripes and decided to decorate the home’s masonry stove with stripes.

“It was a kind of an obsession,” Heidi muses. They had already painted the stove in another room fjord green before, and it had been a positive experience. The extra challenge posed by stripes did not scare her.

Heidi, who loves colors, grew tired of the white masonry stove that didn’t match the rest of the home’s color scheme.

The shade of the red paint is N329 from Tikkurila’s Symphony color chart. The preparation and painting of the stove took a total of about eight hours over two days. The stove is in heavy use, and it had to be lit after only two coats of paint had been finished. Therefore, the third coat had to wait until summer.

What was done

Heidi went to the hardware store to ask which paint color was closest to Fazer’s Marianne candy. She used Superlateksi for the red paint. The white stripes are fireplace paint. The most laborious and challenging phase was taping the edges. For that, Heidi received a good tip from the hardware store: after taping, paint over the tape with the base color—in this case, white—so that the base paint fills the small gaps left in the tape. Then the red stripes were painted. This made the edges cleaner.

The previous, slightly glossy white color is visible on the areas that were taped. Heidi intentionally left it unpainted.

The stove still has its magnificent ornamental doors. It is not known whether the stove is original from when the house was constructed in the 1930s or if it was built slightly later.

What was achieved

The stove became the energizer of the living room and a favorite among the followers of Heidi’s @luhtila_ Instagram account. Heidi named the stove the Candy Stove. The diagonal stripes also harmonize well with the black-and-white striped plank floor of the home’s kitchen. After the photoshoot, the masonry wall behind the stove was painted green. Next, Heidi plans to paint the wall-mounted radiators with patterns.

Baby Helli can watch the fire in the stove for a couple of hours every morning. Heidi is on maternity leave from her home economics teaching job and has time to carry out small renovations at home.