Wood or gas. Everything else follows from that.
Custom Outdoor Fireplace Installation Across Georgia
An outdoor fireplace is a built structure: a firebox, a chimney and a footing under all of it, finished in stone, brick or render to suit the house. It is the thing you sit in front of rather than around, and it is a construction job rather than an object you place. Aqualis Pools also takes on projects across Florida, Georgia, and South Carolina.
A Statement Feature for Outdoor Living
What an Outdoor Fireplace Is, and What It Is Not
A fireplace has a front. You sit facing it, it works against a wall or at the end of a space, and it gives a seating area a direction it did not have before. That is its real job, and it is the reason it changes a backyard more than its size suggests.
A fire pit is the other option and it is not a lesser one. It is open, people sit all the way round it, and it costs a fraction of a built fireplace. If what you want is somewhere for eight people to sit together on a cool evening, a pit does that better and cheaper, and we would rather tell you that now.
If the fire is going near the pool rather than in a seating area away from it, that is a different product again, closer to a bowl or a built-in feature than to a fireplace, and it is covered under fire features.
What a fireplace is not is a quick addition. It is masonry on a footing with a flue running up through it, so it is planned with the ground rather than dropped onto it.
Wood or Gas
This is the first decision, and the build, the running cost and the position all follow from it.
Wood. A real fire, with the sound and the smell and the heat that goes with it. It needs a flue sized and built to draw properly, which is the part that separates a fireplace that works from one that fills the patio with smoke. It also needs somewhere to keep dry wood and a routine for clearing ash, and the effort of laying and clearing a fire is a fair thing to weigh when you are deciding how often it will actually get lit.
Gas. On in seconds, off in seconds, no smoke, no ash and nothing to store. It needs a gas line run to the position, or a propane tank location decided before anything is built, which is a design decision rather than a delivery one. The flame and the heat are not the same as a wood fire, and that is a matter of preference rather than a fault: some people want the ritual, some people want to press a switch on a Tuesday.
Where the smoke goes, if it is wood. This is the point that gets missed until the first evening. A wood fireplace under or beside a covered structure changes how the smoke behaves, so the position of a pavilion or a pergola relative to the chimney is a decision to make on the drawing rather than afterwards. The direction the prevailing wind takes the smoke, and where it takes it relative to the house and the neighbours, is worth ten minutes on site before anything is agreed.
The structure and the paperwork. A masonry chimney is a structure with a footing, and whether it needs permitting is a local question rather than a general one. It is worth answering before it is drawn, not after.
Decisions Made Before the Footing Is Poured
Where it faces. A fireplace makes a room out of an open space, so it wants a back to it: a boundary, a planted edge or the end of a terrace. Standing on its own in the middle of a lawn it looks like an object rather than a wall.
What it stands on. On the ground it is a footing and a hardscaping job. On a raised custom deck it is both a load question and a clearance-to-combustibles question, and it has to be designed into the deck framing rather than added to a deck that already exists. This is the one point on the page where the answer is sometimes simply no, and it is better to hear that before the deck is built.
Hearth and seating distance. How far the hearth projects and how far back the seating sits decide whether people can actually feel the fire without moving furniture every time. It is a small dimension with a large effect on whether the thing gets used.
The finish. Stone, brick or render, and whether it matches the house or deliberately does not. A fireplace is a permanent vertical surface in a garden, so it is worth choosing it alongside the other hard finishes rather than in isolation.
Storage, if it burns wood. Somewhere dry and close enough to be convenient. Built into the structure it looks deliberate; added later it looks like a pile of logs.
Light around it. A fire lights a small circle and leaves everything past it dark, so the surrounding lighting is specified with the fireplace rather than after it. Getting to the seating in the dark is the part people forget.
Building It So It Is Safe to Use
The live page says it is safe and does not say why, so here is what actually makes it so. A wood fireplace needs a flue built to draw, and clearance between the fire and anything that can burn: a roof, a rafter, a fence, a planted edge, decking. A gas fireplace needs its supply installed and tested by someone qualified to do it. Both need a footing that does not move.
Beyond the build, the usual sense applies: an open fire is not left burning unattended, and where children use the space the seating layout matters as much as the fire does.
What an Outdoor Fireplace Costs
More than a fire pit, and driven by height, finish and fuel rather than by footprint. What moves the number: how tall the chimney is, whether the facing is stone, brick or render, whether a gas line has to be run and how far, whether the ground needs work before the footing, and whether it is built alongside other work or on its own visit.
Where a fireplace forms part of a larger project, pool financing options apply to it in the same way they apply to the pool.
Where It Sits in the Rest of the Backyard
A fireplace and an outdoor kitchen are often one masonry job rather than two, which is worth knowing before they are quoted separately: same trade, same materials, same visit. Seating usually wants to be near enough to the cook to talk and far enough from the grill to be comfortable, and the fireplace is often what defines that second position.
How the whole sequence works against a pool, a deck and the ground between them is set out on our outdoor living page.
What Our Clients Say
Aqualis Pools is rated 5.0 on Google, from a small number of reviews, and every one can be read on the profile.
Outdoor Fireplaces Across Georgia
We design and build outdoor fireplaces for homeowners in Lawrenceville, Buford, Loganville, Athens, Auburn and nearby Georgia communities. The full list is on our service areas page, and finished work is in the gallery (-> ).
Frequently Asked Questions
Wood gives you a real fire, and it needs a flue built to draw, dry wood stored somewhere and ash cleared afterwards. Gas gives you a fire in seconds with nothing to store and nothing to clean, and it needs a gas line or a propane position decided before anything is built. Neither is better. The honest test is whether you want the ritual of laying a fire or the convenience of switching one on, because that decides how often it gets used.
A fire pit is open and people sit all the way around it. A fireplace has a chimney and a front-facing opening, so people sit facing it and it works against a wall or an edge. A pit is the cheaper and more sociable option; a fireplace gives a space a focal point and a direction, and costs considerably more because it is a built structure.
Sometimes, and it has to be designed into the deck rather than added to one already built, because it is a load question and a clearance-to-combustibles question at the same time. On the ground, on a proper footing, is always the simpler route. If a deck is already in place, ask that question before anything else.
Not if the flue is built to draw properly, which is the main thing that separates a fireplace that works from one that does not. The other half is position: where the chimney sits relative to any covered structure, the house and the boundary decides where the smoke actually goes on a still evening. Both are drawing-board decisions, not adjustments.
It is masonry on a footing, so it is a construction programme rather than an installation, and any permitting for the structure is part of that timeline rather than an afterthought.
A well-built fireplace that suits the house adds to how a property presents. Whether it returns its cost at resale is debated, and a permanent masonry structure is more specific to one owner’s taste than most additions. Build it because you will sit in front of it.
Start Planning Your Outdoor Fireplace
Two answers shape the quote quickly. Wood or gas? And is there a wall, a boundary or an edge for it to work against, or is it standing on its own? The first decides the build; the second decides whether it will feel like a room or like an ornament.
Call (770) 373-8405 or send us a message.