A massive, angled fireplace dominates one wall of the 400 sq. ft. addition. When the fireplace first arrived, explains Ms. Sorbara, it was placed against the wall of the “big and beautiful” new living room, where it stuck out like a sore thumb…or pimple. So, she and Mr. Birkenshaw “drew it and drew it and drew it” until they arrived at a plan: a false wall. “All of the space in here,” she says, touching the drywall over the firebox, “is air, and it’s really gut-wrenching to give up space, but space is not a huge problem in this house.”Fernando Morales/The Globe and Mail