I am thinking about buying a wood stove, but because of the space of the room I want to put it in, I would need to construct a non combustible heat shield in order to reduce clearances. Does anyone have any thoughts about the best materials to use to accomplish this? I would like to keep costs as reasonable as possible, but can splurge if necessary.

FYI, a Tulikivi distributor mentioned to me that they typically use steel, which they say can be faced by stone if desired, and would reduce clearance for their stoves to 3". We are not necessarily going with Tulikivi, but that option sounded viable.