DIY Fire Pit Ideas That Change The Landscape
A DIY smokeless fire pit is exactly what your backyard is missing. There’s something magical and unique about sitting around a smokeless fire pit with friends and family and enjoying each other’s company. Wouldn’t it be nice to have a DIY fire pit in you backyard? There are plenty of DIY smokeless fire pit ideas to choose from that will improve your landscape.
You don’t have to remodel the space to make that happen. A DIY fire pit is a fun weekend project that is also easy and inexpensive.
The Anatomy Of A Fire Pit
A fire pit can range in size from a simple hole excavated in the ground to sophisticated metal or brick structures that burn gas. The common characteristic of fire pits is that they are intended to confine and inhibit the spread of fire.
Because there are many materials that can make up a fire pit, its anatomy will differ from one type to another.
For example, a fire pit kit that has concrete paver blocks usually comes with a metal liner, construction adhesive which is used to fix the paver blocks in place, and capstones located at the top.
How Much Does an Average DIY Fire Pit Cost?
A fire pit costs on average $700 to build. The cost of the project might range from $300 to $1,400. Labor is charged at a cost of $55 per hour, or approximately $340 per task, while supplies are charged at a rate of around $400.
Naturally, this will vary depending on the materials you use, whether you hire a contractor or decide to do this yourself, what type of fuel the fire pit is going to use, or what type of material you want surrounding the pit, if any.
If you live in a location where spring and summer bring forth swarms of flying pests, you may want to consider an enclosure.
One of the decisions you’ll need to make before determining the materials and supplies you’ll require, and the cost of your project is the type of fuel you’ll use in the fire pit.
Certain materials are not suitable for all fuel types, the maintenance requirements may vary, and some will require the assistance of an electrician or plumber.
Materials Needed for a DIY Fire Pit
Once you’ve decided on the fuel source for your fire pit, it’s time to pick up some supplies. Of course, the exact materials you need will depend on the type of fire pit you are making and where you plan to put it in your yard.
In general, you will want some sort of stone or cement, a way to attach them to one another, and a way to make a hole for the firepit to drain.
Here’s a list of DIY fire pit materials you can consider:
- Stones
- Bricks
- Concrete Blocks
- Shovel (to dig)
- Cement mix
- Steel Pit Ring
- Metal Grate
- Sand
- Gravel
- Rubber mallet
- Paint if you desire
Although bricks and concrete blocks are the easiest materials to make a DIY fire pit with, you can use other materials like glass, recycled metal, or even old flower pots.
Just be sure whatever you use is fireproof, and know that if it is metal, it will be hot to the touch when a fire is in the pit.
Can You Make an Indoor DIY Fire Pit?
Most people choose to build a fire pit in their backyard as it is easier to clean up, but you may be wondering if it is possible to build your own fire pit indoors.
The good news is, you absolutely can. Indoor fire pits can be used to spruce up a sitting room or lounge area during the cold winter months.
Be aware, however, that building a fire pit indoors is a big project, and you will need to ensure the fire pit runs on gas, as wood-burning fires are not safe to have indoors.
If you absolutely must have a wood-burning fire indoors, it’s best to keep it in the fireplace rather than building a DIY indoor fire pit.
DIY Fire Pit vs. Pre-made Fire Pit
When it comes to choosing a new fire pit, the key is determining which type is most suited to your needs. Consider your budget and the quality of the fire pit before deciding between a bespoke or prefabricated fire pit for your property.
Additionally, you should evaluate which will allow you to make the most of your outdoor oasis and create enduring memories.
Price
A fire pit DIY kit purchased from a local hardware store would cost homeowners between $100 and $500 for a simple construction. On the pricier end of the range, prefabricated models can cost homeowners between $1,000 and $4,000.
The advantage of kits is that they are easy to find in brick-and-mortar stores or supplied right to your home, allowing homeowners to begin installation immediately. However, design options and construction materials are more limited.
Custom fire pits do require a greater financial commitment. Custom designs normally begin at $5,000. The cost of these items reflects the design, time, and labor involved in creating a personalized fire pit.
Additionally, custom fire pits offer a wide variety of design and material possibilities, allowing you to exercise creative control over the entire project. For many people, the additional alternatives available exceed the additional time required to complete the project.
Quality of materials
Custom fire pits are constructed to resist extreme weather conditions. These permanent buildings need additional funding at the outset but result in a solid, long-lasting structure.
You are making an investment in a space that your family will benefit from for years to come. The value is in the structure’s quality and the moments spent around your new personalized fire pit.
A prefabricated fire pit is of significantly inferior quality than its handcrafted equivalent. While the materials used in prefabricated kits are durable for a few seasons, they inevitably fracture, fall apart, or corrode.
What Stone Is Best for a DIY Fire Pit?
Almost any type of rock can explode, particularly porous and moist rocks. When wet rocks become heated, the trapped water and air expand rapidly and violently shatter the rock, occasionally causing it to explode.
River rocks, gravel, pumice, limestone, and sandstone are all examples of rocks that should be avoided when building a fire pit due to their porous nature and proclivity to retain water.
Due to the density of hard rocks (such as slate, marble, or granite), they are less prone to absorb water and burst when exposed to heat. Additionally, fire-rated brick, poured concrete, lava rocks, and lava glass are all safe to use around and in your fire pit.
This is one place where lava rocks can be used to ensure the safety of a fire pit. If your fire pit contains or is surrounded by rocks, exercise caution when igniting flames after it has rained.
Wet rocks have a far greater chance of exploding than dry rocks. If you use your fire pit frequently, you may want to consider covering it during inclement weather to keep it dry and to keep yourself safe.
Most Important Things to Consider When DIY Fire Pit
You may think that a fire pit is a mere hole in the ground, but there are a lot of things to consider before building one.
Local regulations
Local regulations and ordinances govern how and whether a fire pit is permitted in your neighborhood. Certain fire pit codes are designated as outdoor burning or recreational fire codes, while others are included in the broader local fire code.
Before you begin creating your new patio fire pit, check to see if it is legal and if any restrictions apply. You definitely want to avoid spending money on your perfect patio fire pit only to be fined and forced to remove it.
Fuel source
Fire pits can have different fuel sources, such as propane tanks, natural gas, gel, or wood. When compared to wood-burning fire pits, propane fire pits are simple to use, easy to light, and burn quickly.
Because they produce no ash or smoke, they can typically be used notwithstanding municipal fire restrictions. Additionally, they are much easier to clean.
After determining the size of the tank required for non-wood patio fire pits, the following step is to select the size of the tank. This will vary according to the size of your fire pit and the frequency with which you intend to use it.
Safety precautions
Along with keeping your patio fire pit clear of existing structures, it’s critical that it’s situated or built on level ground. If you’re utilizing a wood-burning fire pit, a metal screen is necessary to assist contain sparks and ash.
Keep it clear of overhanging trees and bushes, and away from important sidewalks and paths to avoid being a nuisance.
Design
Fire pits come in a variety of styles. The most popular types are fire bowls and square-shaped bowls. A bowl is a fantastic solution for tiny yards and is often popular for portable designs. You can pick between square or rectangular fire pits for huge, permanent fire pits.
Apart from their varied shapes, they also feature a variety of designs. Select those that will fit comfortably in your space. After settling on the best size and location, consider function.
By answering a few broad design and style questions, you can begin the process of selecting or building the ideal patio fire pit for your backyard.
Dangerous materials
Fire pits are often composed of an inner and outer wall, a cap, and decorative stones or other materials placed at the base of the pit.
The inner wall must be constructed entirely of fireproof materials, preferably fire brick; the exterior walls must still be resistant to heat but may be constructed entirely of masonry block, stone, or even heat-resistant outdoor stucco or tile.
Flagstone is an excellent material for the cap of the fire pit. No component of the fire pit should be constructed using nonporous or flammable materials that retain moisture. That means you should avoid compressed concrete blocks, river rocks, or pea gravel.
25 DIY Fire Pit Ideas to Transform Your Garden This Year
1. A Fire Pit Using Concrete Tree Rings
If you’re not yet sure where exactly you’d like your new DIY fire pit to be placed, you can build one that’s easy to take down and move to a different spot.
There’s a great little tutorial on instructables that shows exactly how to do that using four sections of concrete tree rings, a portable charcoal grill, and a bunch of stones and pebbles.
2. A Stone Fireplace-Like Design
A fire pit doesn’t have to take up a lot of space and doesn’t have to be circular. If you’re tight on space you can still pull off a great DIY fire pit project. You just have to plan things accordingly.
We suggest checking out instructables to find more details about this stone fire pit and its fireplace-like design which allows it to fit nicely in corners or against a fence.
3. Create a Fire Pit from Gray Pavers
Three rows of 12” gray pavers arranged in circles make up a perfect fire pit frame. They’re also quite cheap so the project won’t cost you a fortune.
The number of pavers you’ll need may vary depending on the size of the fire pit. In any case, putting together the pit should be easy and fun.
Once that is in place you can arrange a bunch of seats around the fire pit or start planning a DIY outdoor bench project. Check out keepingitsimple for inspiration.
4. Build An In-Ground Fire Pit
Instead of building your DIY fire pit above ground, perhaps you’d be more interested in an in-ground fire pit like this one. Keep in mind that the location you choose will be permanent.
Start by digging a hole, then mix the concrete and start building the walls of the fire pit. Gradually, it will start to take shape. You can find more tips and details about this on instructables.
5. Use Cement Blocks To Build A Simple Fire Pit
You could also use cement blocks to build a simple fire pit. Start by picking the exact location and then level the ground and prep the area.
Once that part is done and you have the outline of the fire pit, building the walls and finishing up the whole thing should be quick and easy. If you like this project, find out more about it on caroleknits.
6. A Cheap and Easy DIY Fire Pit
There’s another DIY fire pit project that might inspire you and you can find it on attachmentprone. The total cost of the materials, in this case, was $75.
The fire pit was built using 6 square cement pavers for the base and 30 cinder bricks. If you also like to build a matching bench or two around the fire pit, you might want to get some extra cinder bricks.
7. Transform A Small Koi Pond Into A Fire Pit
Isn’t this fire pit super charming? What’s interesting about it is the fact that it used to be a small koi pond. At one point it was transformed but even as a fire pit it still has a very organic and genuine look thanks to the stones and irregular shape.
Check out lucyslampshade to find out more about this inspiring transformation.
8. Use Bricks to Build a Fire Pit
You can also old and reclaimed materials when building a DIY fire pit. For example, the used bricks here come from a landscape site. If your project will be anything like the one featured on tuffguardhose you’ll need around 40 bricks (or pavers).
You’ll also need a shovel, landscaping stone or gravel, and spray paint (to trace the outline of the pit on the ground before you start digging.
9. Start A DIY Fire Pit With A Metal Fire Ring
A very cool and at the same time practical idea is to use a metal fire ring like the one featured in this project from imgur. The project started with an outline of the fire pit slightly wider than required.
The grass was removed and the ground was leveled, then the ring was placed in the middle. Three layers of stone were added around the fire ring. As you can see, it turned out pretty great.
10. A Fun Weekend Project to Enjoy with Your Friends
Building a DIY fire pit can be a great weekend project for a group of friends and this applies to anyone. None of you has to be an expert in landscaping in order to pull this off.
In fact, it’s best if everyone is equally inexperienced because this way you’re all just learning from each other. Anyway, here’s how you can build a brick fire pit from scratch: mark the spot and start digging (not too deep, just a few cm/inches).
Place the first level of bricks and make sure they’re level. Add the second, third and fourth layers and at the end place some decorative stone on top. Finally, put some gravel on the bottom and you’re done. Check out imgur for details.
11. A Sunburst Fire Pit
If you want your new DIY fire pit to be not just cozy but also spectacular, there are ways to make that happen. We recently came across this cool sunburst fire pit design on imgur.
It looks pretty awesome and it doesn’t seem that difficult to build either. It does however require plenty of space.
12. Use Stones of All Shapes and Sizes to Create a Fire Pit
A fire pit doesn’t have to look perfect or be perfectly symmetrical in order to look great and to be an awesome focal point for the backyard. Plenty of DIY fire pit projects focuses on this very idea, including this one that was featured on imgur.
The stone has different shapes and sizes and that gives the design a very genuine and unique look.
13. A Circular Fire Pit
Of course, if you’d prefer your DIY fire pit to have a neat and clean design and to be simple and professional-looking, that’s easy to achieve too. A perfect example is this project from abeautifulmess.
The supplies needed here include gravel, a shovel, concrete landscaping stones, a metal ring, masonry adhesive, and colored spray paint (optional but useful).
14. Mix And Match Different Materials
It’s practical and sometimes even aesthetic to mix and match different materials when building a fire pit. Maybe this project from imgur is not the best example in this case since this look wasn’t exactly intentional from the start but we really like how it turned out.
15. An Indoor Fire Pit for Your Living Room
As lovely as those classic outdoor fire pits are, you can pretty much only use them when it’s nice outside. What if you wanted to feel just as cozy indoors?
You could make a small portable fire pit for your living room. You can take it out on the porch too. One of the items you’ll need is a glass box. Check out theartofdoingstuff for more details.
16. A Fire Pit with a Metal Frame Made of Steel
This fire pit has a metal frame made of steel stripes. There’s stone in between and the overall design is a nice mix of modern, rustic, and industrial.
You can make your own version which you can customize according to your own needs and preferences. To learn the basics and a few tips that might help along the way, check out this video tutorial on youtube.
17. A Concrete Fire Pit
A concrete fire pit is yet another option. Of course, you’d have to be pretty certain about the location since you won’t be able to move the fire pit once it’s in place.
A great advantage, in this case, is the fact that you can give your DIY fire pit any shape you want. Building the mold is perhaps the most difficult part. You can find out everything you need to know about the project on instructables.
18. A Metal Fire Pit
If you like the idea of a metal fire pit, we suggest having a look at this tutorial featured on the-brick-house. It documents the important steps of putting together such a project and it also helps you form an informed idea of how it would all look once you’re done.
19. A Fire Pit Made Out Of A Recycled Washing Machine Drum
Believe it or not, this awesome-looking fire pit was made out of a recycled washing machine drum. It would be great if you already had one but you could also check used appliance stores or ask around.
Apart from that, you’ll also need an angle grinder, a wire brush, a sanding disc, some steel, and heat-resistant black paint. Everything else that you need to know about this unique DIY fire pit project can be found on houseandfig.
20. DIY Fire Pit Made Out Of A Tractor Wheel
Speaking of DIY projects involving recycled items, here’s a cool-looking DIY fire pit made out of a tractor wheel. The project is not complicated but you need a few specific things: a tractor rim, some stone blocks, gravel, and sand.
The overall size of the fire pit depends on how big the rim is and how wide the stones are. You’ll also have to do some digging so make sure you have a shovel.
Feel free to personalize and customize the look of your fire pit in any way you want. The tutorial from handimania can be a source of inspiration.
21. A Large Cinder Block Fire Pit
For anyone with a huge garden space to fill, take a look at this large DIY fire pit area from Tools 2 Tiaras. Instead of just adding a small feature fire pit to your garden, this completely transforms a section of your outdoor space.
Even more impressive, this whole project only cost $20. Instead of spending hundreds of dollars on a new fire pit, you can reuse and recycle old materials to make a unique feature in your garden.
This project uses cinder blocks for the foundation and then cement landscape edging to create the walls. Old stamped bricks are added to those, and the project is complete.
22. A Simple DIY Fire Pit
If you don’t have space or time to create a huge cinder block fire pit like the one we showcased above, consider this smaller project from Scattered Thoughts of a Crafty Mom. This project is relatively easy to complete and looks extremely professional once it’s finished.
The only hard work involved is shoveling the dirt and unloading the retaining wall blocks. Otherwise, it’s a fun project to complete with your partner or friends one weekend.
Add a selection of chairs around the fire pit, and you’ll be ready to invite everyone around for a fun gathering in no time at all.
23. Make a DIY Modern Concrete Fire Pit from Scratch
Just because you’ve decided to make a DIY fire pit, it doesn’t mean that you can’t create a modern and stylish one like you’d buy in a store.
Man-Made DIY shares this incredible modern concrete fire pit which looks just like some of the fancy options you’d buy for hundreds of dollars. In just a few hours and with materials that will set you back less than $50, you’ll have a beautiful centerpiece for your garden.
It’s a sleek and modern device that’s also portable. It will use gel fuel, so you can have a very quick fire pit session without worrying about it burning for hours.
Finally, it’s made with weather-resistant concrete, so it’s perfect for anyone who lives in an area with unpredictable weather.
24. Build A DIY Adirondack Fire Bowl Table
Interior Frugalista shows us how to create this beautiful DIY fire bowl table which is designed to be used with small eco logs or gel burners, as opposed to burning firewood.
It’s a great option to use on a deck alongside a patio set, meaning that anyone with a smaller backyard doesn’t have to miss out on the fun of having a fire pit. You’ll start by building a table, which the fire bowl then fits inside of.
The table can also double up as a footstool, so it won’t go to waste in the daytime when it’s not being used as a fire pit.
25. DIY Mini Table Top Fire Pit Bowl
This is another great inclusive option that’s perfect for smaller gardens and outdoor spaces. The Garden Love offers us this DIY burning bowl, which is perfect for outdoor summer activities.
You’ll enjoy a stylish addition to your garden, with a beautiful concrete burning bowl. It will improve your overall garden atmosphere while also adding a lovely flow at night time.
You’ll add a bag of river rocks onto the concrete, which can be arranged in a unique pattern to suit your preferences.
Where Can You Buy a DIY Fire Pit Kit?
Gathering all of the supplies you need to build a DIY fire pit kit can be challenging. Many craft stores and hardware stores have kits that you can purchase and use to build your own fire pit.
You can also search online for these kits and have them delivered directly to your home.
These kits come with a gas insert to start the fire, and materials to contain it. They will still require some assembly, as well as some additional materials, so even if you buy one, you will still feel like you are making your very own fire pit.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)FAQ
Can You Build a DIY Fire Pit With Just $50?
While it is possible to build a fire pit with just $50, you may find this a bit difficult to accomplish if you don’t have bricks or cement blocks laying around. It is better to plan at least $100 to $150 when making a DIY fire pit.
Can You Build a DIY Gas Fire Pit?
You can build a DIY gas fire pit; however, you will need to buy the gas fire component as an insert. You can buy these inserts at hardware stores or online.
How Does a DIY Fire Pit Get Air?
Most DIY fire pits have a large enough hole to get air through the top. But for those who have made their firepit too tall, you can easily remove part of a bottom layer brick and add an air vent.
Is Making a DIY Fire Pit Cheap?
Making a DIY fire pit can be cheap when you already have several of the supplies lying around and you just want to burn wood. But when you want a gas fire pit, or you need to buy all the bricks, you will find a DIY fire pit will likely still cost you a couple of hundred dollars.
DIY Smokeless Fire Pit Conclusion
Regardless of the size of your garden or outdoor space, a fire pit is a perfect addition for outdoor gatherings. Whether you choose to make a DIY fire pit or buy one from an online store, you’ll find your family and friends will love hanging out this year at your new garden focal point.
Even if you have a small garden, we think this is a great investment and one that you can use at any time of the year. If you live in a cooler climate, it will help you spend a little more time outdoors without getting chilly in the colder months. Whichever fire pit you go for this year, we hope it makes a great addition to your garden setup.