When I was in college I worked for a summer in Glacier National Park for the company that ran the grand old lodges at Many Glacier, Lake McDonald, and East Glacier. I loved those magnificent european inspired holdovers from the great Railroad travel era. I was pretty much in awe of the fireplace at Lake McDonald Lodge at the southern entrance to the park. The fireplace opening was so big at 6’6″ tall you could stand up in it. I’d never seen anything like it… and they kept a fire going in it all year round! Now, that’s a fireplace! When it came time to design the Great Room fireplace for the Timber Trails residence, my thoughts returned to Lake McDonald. Online research turned up other inspirations of many shapes… perhaps cousins if only in size to the one at Glacier. So inspired, we put pencil to paper and came up with this fireplace which, although large enough to stand up in, is sized and shaped to best compliment the room in which it stands. Benches on either side of the fireplace will provide a wonderful warm niche on a snowy day. Even though this fireplace is an original design, its inspiration is firmly rooted in the past. In design, nothing is truly new and credit is always to be shared with those who came before.
