When removing a lower cabinet in the kitchen of the house we had just purchased, the plaster over the chimney was damaged, exposing the brick. I was in good shape, so I simply knocked all the plaster off, exposing two sides of the square chimney. I loved it! It gave the room some charm and character.

Any chance it would be a nice cozy touch?

Barbara

There's no easy way to remove a chimney. It's a dirty, messy, somewhat dangerous job. The standard practice is to start at the roof and work your way down, dropping the loosened bricks into the chimney as you go. This leaves a few tons of brick, mortar and possibly flue tiles to haul out of the basement. How many walls will need to be opened up varies, of course, from house to house. Be aware, too, that once a chimney is removed, you've created a chimney-like opening without any sort of firestops which will undoubtably violate all local building codes and a good deal of common sense.
I'd suggest thinking really carefully about whether removing the chimney is really necessary or desireable. If the chimney is in poor shape and/or unlined, it can be repaired much more easily than taking it down. Having a spare chimney available for possible installation of a woodstove or other heater needing a Class A vent is a plus for you and any potential buyer in the future. Having a new interior brick chimney built costs anywhere from 8 to 12k dollars. Why destroy such value?

The 'trick' to dismantling brick structures is to remember mortar is very weak in tension, but strong in compression.

Drive a chisel into the highest mortar joint aiming the chisel and hammer slightly upwards.
The brick will lift up and out.
Getting the first brick of each course out is more work thqan the rest of the course.
Once one brick in the course is out, drive the chisel vertically into the joint at the end of the adjacent brick.
The brick will move sideways into the hole left by the previous brick without a lot of work.
Repeat as required.

A plugging chisel can be used to help get the first brick loose by removing the mortar from a joint.

if you have enough room to place the chisel and swing a drilling hammer, you can drive under the next brick parallel to its length and pop it up also.

Be careful, sometimes your floor joists and support for the entire house is tied into or connected with the chimney somehow and so you wouldnt want to remove it. Or so I was told. I suspect this may be the case with my house because the floor around the chimney on the 2nd floor is quite a bit higher than around the periphery of the house which has settled over time.

We just did this two weeks ago - same idea, old walled-in chimney in the kitchen. It didn't extend thru the roof, so it had been unused for decades. Fewer holes to patch! Buying a hammer drill made all the difference. That plus a sledge for the liner, and the chimney was down from the second floor to below the kitchen floor level in about a day. We left the basement portion intact. Dusty, but the project was well worth it.

Removing a chimney in its entirety is a significant job. Just think how much labor it's going to take to remove all of those bricks from top to bottom.

The best way to get an accurate cost is to contract several tradesmen to get bids. They should give you a good idea on what the true cost and scope of the job will be.

I am a roofer, so we usually only remove the chimney stack and demolition down into the attic. Depending on the job it will usually cost about $1,000 to remove the top part of the chimney and then repairing the roof could cost $1,500+.

2500 to pull the stack and fix the roof?? Must be nice making all that ...? We just had a stack and interior attic chimney pulled out of a 3 story house with roof and floor repair included for under $500.00. He climbed on the roof during another job they were doing and just started tossing bricks into the yard. In the inside, he continued down to the floor. Ten feet inside to the ceiling, plus another 5' that was over the roof. He patched the roof with plywood and boards under it. Patched the floor up clean and nice. Whole job took under 4 hours. The chimney was leaning inside the attic and also leaked around the roof. House is 40 feet high and 130 years old.

Don't throw those bricks away. Use them for a walkway or sell them to someone.

Of course! They are part of the house and I'm going to make something cool out of them, they belong here! ☺

Any updates on this project? We are thinking of doing the same to expand our kitchen.