A brick is essentially a modular unit of fired or dried clay which has evolved as a building material throughout the centuries. The earliest bricks were simply cut from a thin slab of clay with straw reinforcement and then sun-dried. Subsequently, the Romans used wooden frames as moulds to make their bricks and fired them afterwards. Later again, circa the 1100’s bricks were produced using ‘pallet moulding’ and ‘slop moulding methods’. This was a method whereby timber moulds held the clay and any surplus clay was cut off. The timber mould technique remains the method for hand-made bricks today.
Later on, industrial techniques allowed for mass-production, forcing the clay into multiple moulds, and on to pallets or by using extruding machines which formed a length 10 or so bricks long and cut with wire before firing. Modem bricks have holes through the centre to reduce drying, and firing and handling costs.
This evolution of the manufacturing of bricks throughout history has implications on the appearance, function and performance of the material in the buildings they are used in. The first step to act in the conservation of any brickwork is to determine what type of brick is used. This is achieved through the examining of the form, size and evidence of manufacturing methods used. This information can then be checked against pre-existing publications that aid in the identifying of brickwork.
Once the brick has been identified, appropriate techniques can be determined for the repair of any defects within conservation guidelines.
uld be removing the patina and the aesthetics of ageing of the structure. By doing this you are going down the route of restoration rather than conservation. Also, in the majority of cases this would not come under the principle of ‘minimal intervention’ as cleaning is not fundamental to the preservation of the building.
Another questionable intervention would be the imitation of patina that can be acquired through soot and mud. This is going against a number of ethics and principles in that the patina is not authentic and the intervention would not be legible but instead would blend in with the rest of the building, leaving question marks over what has been repaired or replaced.
Brick in itself seems to be an excellent material to withstand the passage of time once preventative maintenance work is done periodically. More specifically, repointing and crack repair.
