Does living in a mountain valley or cove make wood smoke hang around my house longer?
Yes. Arden runs along the Hendersonville Road corridor at 2,150 feet, where the valley funnels cold air down the low ground on winter nights and caps it, holding wood smoke close over Royal Pines and Skyland instead of letting it rise — and the older neighborhoods here have exactly the fireplaces that make the most of it.
Tired open masonry pours smoke and loses heat
The 1980s-and-90s homes across Royal Pines and Skyland are full of open masonry fireplaces that are past their prime. They pull cold-air drafts into the room and send most of the fire's smoke — and heat — straight up a wide flue. On a still corridor night that plume settles right back over the neighborhood. If your fireplace makes the room colder and the yard smoky, it's doing both jobs backward.
A sealed insert turns it into a real heater
Dropping a sealed insert into that open masonry opening fixes the draftiness and the plume at the same time. On Arden's natural-gas mains, a Heat & Glo or Napoleon direct-vent insert makes essentially no visible smoke and actually heats the room. Prefer wood? A modern EPA insert from Regency burns far cleaner than the open box and holds an overnight burn.
Permitted, and close to home
Every gas line we run in Arden gets a Buncombe County permit and an inspector. We're only 15 minutes south of the Asheville showroom, so service is quick. Call (828) 545-0525 for a free in-home assessment of your firebox and options.
Fireplace help in Arden
We install and service fireplaces throughout Arden and the rest of Buncombe County — just 15 minutes south from our Asheville-area showroom.
Related questions
- Can smoke from my wood fireplace bother my neighbors?
- Should I skip having a fire on air quality alert or burn ban days?
- What can I do if my neighbor's wood smoke keeps getting into my house?
- Does a wood-burning insert pollute less than an open fireplace?
- Are there wood-burning restrictions or burn bans in the Asheville area?