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Nov 12, 2024

Ina Garten's Moody, Minimalist Mantel Is Perfect for Fireplace Season

Set the coziest mood just by lighting your fireplace. Sharon is a writer and contributor at Better Homes & Gardens, where she writes, edits, and updates content on the website, refreshing recipes and

Set the coziest mood just by lighting your fireplace.

Sharon is a writer and contributor at Better Homes & Gardens, where she writes, edits, and updates content on the website, refreshing recipes and articles about home design, holiday planning, gardening, and other topics. Before joining Better Homes & Gardens, Sharon began her career as a blogger, then became a freelance writer, focusing on home design and organization, midlife and empty nesting, and seniors and eldercare. Her work has been published on a range of websites, including Angi, Purple Clover, HuffPost, Grown and Flown, Seniors Matter, AARP’s the Girlfriend and the Ethel, and many other outlets.

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Ina Garten's name has become synonymous with comfort food—her familiar, soothing voice has talked us through her beloved recipes for decades, and her cookbooks are lauded as staples in homes everywhere, featuring her iconic Beatty’s Chocolate Cake and Perfect Roast Chicken.

While she's known for her cooking, Garten's East Hampton house has grown to be almost as much of a favorite as her meals. As shown on her social media, her space's classically-beautiful decor reflects the home’s contemporary country look, and its extensive gardens are as gorgeous as the interiors.

In a recent Instagram post, Garten showed off her living room, sharing a video of a fire burning in her fireplace.

“First fire of the season! Have a great weekend, everyone!” she captioned it.

The video amassed over 104,000 likes, and what may be surprising to some is the moody, minimalistic look of the hearth and mantel—a bit of a departure from Garten's usual style. A large, gilded-framed mirror acts as the centerpiece, with a few sleek black candlesticks and some simple branches in a slim vase surrounding it. The facade is a smooth, white atop a black stone floor treatment.

The curated look allows the fire to be the focal point, with the rest of the decor taking a backseat to the flames. Recreate this look in your home by clearing your mantel of too much clutter and using a monochromatic color theme for decor. Keep the hearth accents to only what’s necessary, like Garten does.

Comments praised her design choices, with many also mentioning the chef's recently published memoir Be Ready When the Luck Happens, which has been on The New York Times Bestseller list since its debut on October 1. As Garten said on Instagram, “Writing this book was a completely new experience for me. There is no recipe for writing a memoir, and the process helped me see that what happened to me in my 20s and 30s prepared me for what was to come.”

“In my last chapter of the book, I don’t want it to end!" one fan wrote on her post. "Where is the fireplace? [East Hampton] main house? Barn? Paris?” To which she replied, “The house in East Hampton. It got a little facelift during the pandemic.”

It’s safe to say Garten will be spending many more cozy hours curled up in front of the fire this winter with her husband Jeffrey by her side and a plate of treats at the ready. As she says: “Most of life's problems can be solved with a good cookie.”