Before the advent of central heating people bought fires for the amount of heat they generated and how they looked was of minor importance. Today, where almost 90 per cent of households in the UK have some sort of central heating, it would be logical to think there was no longer a need for the traditional fireplace - but that’s far from the case. For the vast majority of people, a room without a fireplace lacks a focal point. As a result, many fireplaces are bought primarily for aesthetic reasons or to create a centrepiece to counteract the television.

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Few things in life are more comforting than a blazing fire, regardless of whether the flames are real or illusionary. Fireplaces give us somewhere to stare into and daydream, somewhere to stand in front of when you come in from the cold, somewhere to hanging Christmas stockings and swathes of holly and tinsel. Without it, a room seems cold and uninviting even if the temperature tells you it’s not.

Heating aesthetics no longer depend on the type of fuel available - with so many look-alikes on the market nowadays a stove is still a stove whether it’s fuelled by real logs, coal, gas, electricity or LPG – or on having a conventional fire surround. The last few years has seen an exponential growth in popularity for hole-in-the-wall and hang-on-the-wall fires, which do away with the need for a surround or hearth either because the fire includes some sort of surround in its design or because the fire stands as a decorative entity in itself.

Fireplace styles also follow fashion trends. When beech gained huge favour a few years ago for flooring and furniture it was quickly reflected in fire surround design. Nowadays the trend is for darker woods, with oak being the choice of many, either as a solid wood or veneer. Really dark woods like walnut and cherry have their niche but the mass market is dominated by oak shades. Maple, with its subtly different grain, and elm, where the grain itself has an attractive deep colour, are also popular choices. If you’re buying a hardwood fire surround and mantel check it comes from a sustainable source – most hardwoods come from the tropics where there can be pressure to cut wood at any cost.

What to burn is also subject to choice. While artificial coals represent a real coal fire the popularity of other more contemporary options has spiralled. These include pebbles (rounded, light-coloured cobbles), driftwood, ribbon burners (thin lines of dancing flames) and geometric shapes. At the top end are bespoke metal options that can arguably be classified as works of art in their own right.

Fireplaces are not the only option when it comes to heating aesthetics. Water-filled radiators have undergone perhaps the biggest evolution in home heating. While under-floor heating is becoming the preferred option with self-builders - and has many advantages, as it works silently, efficiently and discreetly underfoot and leaves wall space free for other things – if you already have radiators they don’t have to be conventional…and they certainly don’t have to be boring. Modern radiators combine a variety of functions, eg with the addition of shelves, hooks and mirrors. The good thing about radiators is they can be upgraded easily, which allows you to swap old style panel radiators for funkier designs one at a time or only in those rooms where you want to make a statement. Today’s radiators are hot numbers in every sense!