Brick Bulletin Summer 2000

BRICK
Project:
Harley Davidson
showroom,
London
12
14
Project:
Geffrye Museum,
extension, London
22
Project:
Housing,
Glasgow
Technical notes:
Wash and brush up,
Jubilee Line Extension
29
UK £5.00
COVER
House,
Ballihoo,
Caversham
Summer 2000
BRICK
Summer 2000
UPDATE
3-4
Acting editor
Sue Duncan
Technical editor
Michael Hammett
Co-ordinating editor
Ruth Slavid
Production editors
Bill Broun
Eleanor Young
Outram’s Dutch treat
Brick Awards 2000
Brickwork by the book
Inspirational design from across Europe
Second time around
The outcome of the Skills Olympics final
Environmental issues
Wave power at Portsmouth
VIEWPOINT
5-7
Art editor
Terry Howe
Ecohouse designer Dr Susan Roaf on designing
for sustainability
The TIA 2000 conference
PROJECT PROFILES
8-9
10-11
12-13
14-17
18-19
ISSN: 0307-9325
20-21
Published by
22-23
151 Rosebery Avenue
London EC1R 4GB
Printer
24-25
Cradley Print
26-28
Academic building
A new research lab asserts itself on the Bristol
skyline
Housing
A village ambience for Queen's University
student residences
Retail building
A polished performance at Harley-Davidson
showrooms
Public building
The Geffrye Museum Extension provides a new
angle on brickwork
Private house
A new house takes to the water
Structural brickwork
Gillingham Northern Link Road walling uses a
range of brickwork structures
Housing
Award-winning housing in Glasgow uses brick to
the full
Housing
Bold and stylish stripes distinguish Docklands
housing
Public Building
The Contact Theatre brings new drama to
Manchester in more ways than one
TECHNICAL NOTES
29-30
31
2
The Brick
Development
Association Limited
Woodside House
Winkfield
Windsor
Berks SL4 2DX
Tel 01344 885651
Fax 01344 890129
E-mail
brick@brick.org.uk
Website
www.brick.org.uk
Restoration
Restoring brickwork structures at London Bridge
Design guidance
Brickwork openings of non-brick widths
BDA MEMBERS
32
A full listing of members
B
rick Bulletin makes its first
twenty-first century appearance
with a very strong selection of fine
buildings and structures. My personal reaction is to be impressed,
once more, by the infinite possibilities of brick and how this medium
can keep on re-inventing itself, in
the hands of architects and craftsmen, to produce the most amazing
results.
It is such a familiar material
that we run the risk of taking it
for granted, perhaps overlooking
its enduring qualities. As a relative
newcomer to the industry, I have
been struck by the amazing richness and variety of brick and,
perhaps with the zeal of the newly
converted, urge everyone to take a
fresh look at the material.
Look anew at those enduring
qualities of beauty, diversity, flexibility, durability and sustainability.
All of these virtues are illustrated
in this issue. There is a particularly
strong theme of sustainability, with
Dr Susan Roaf’s Viewpoint article
and our sponsorship of the TIA
2000 conference on Sustainable
Buildings. At Manchester’s Contact
Theatre, Alan Short’s brick chimneys have a key role in the natural
ventilation strategy – as well as
creating dramatic new silhouettes.
And at London Bridge station it
is very satisfying to see the beauty
of 170 year-old brickwork vaults,
cleaned and restored, confidently
holding their own against the
prevailing glass and steel context
of the Jubilee Line Extension.
Finally, in London’s East End,
Branson Coates – a practice not
usually associated with brick
buildings – has given solid traditional brickwork and lime mortars
a twist. Its horseshoe-shaped
extension to the Geffrye Museum
has sloping brickwork which really
gives one pause. It makes you look
at the fabric once, twice, and then
again – more closely this time.
Perhaps that’s what we should
all be doing – all of the time.
Con Lenan, chief executive, BDA
Outram’s Dutch treat
The flamboyant polychromatic brickwork in a striking development at The
Hague’s Old Town Hall announces
itself as the work of John Outram
Associates.
The completion of a new town hall
1km away presented the chance for a
unique addition to the already thriving
shopping area. The project, for developer MAB Groep, comprised the conversion of the part Medieval Oude
Stadhuis into offices, plus a new retail
development on the adjoining site. This
Bricks across Europe
Clay Bricks and Tiles in Europe, published by the Fédération Européenne des
Fabriquants de Tuiles et de Briques
(TBE), shows construction ceramics at
their superb best in a series of fine
projects, all of which are beautifully
photographed.
Projects from across the 21 countrystrong membership of the organisation
are shown – for purposes of both education and inspiration. Projects as diverse
as de Montfort University in Leicester
and the nine storey Hotel Lille rub shoulders with Czech apartment buildings and
the new railway station in Seville,
demonstrating the versatility of the medium in diverse architectural styles.
Copies are available at £7.00, only from
the BDA.
was freed by the demolition of the
unloved 1970s Council Chamber, the
rough concrete facades and layout of
which had always been at odds with
the old quarter.
A circular building – the Rotunda –
is at the apex of the triangular site, acting as the main entrance and stair hall
for the first-floor department store. The
other flanks of the scheme contain
shopfronts and are cut back to reveal
the fine facades of the Oude Stadhuis.
In the Oude Stadhuis itself, while
the first floor now houses offices for
rent, the magnificent ground-floor
interiors are retained for public use as a
registry office.
It is the rotunda entrance that marks
out the development as unmistakably
Outram. It has a glazed clay tile roof
sitting on columns clad with a trademark psychedelic palette; the shiny precision of glazed bricks – red, white, yellow, dark and light blue – in combination with blue engineering bricks, each
of them special shaped radius bricks to
achieve the tight arc required. The project was fully let before completion.
Brickwork by the book
In search of excellence
The BDA Guide to
Successful
Brickwork (Second
Edition) is now
available. It is an
indispensable guide
for all involved in
teaching, specifying
or practising good
brickwork and provides comprehensive coverage of the
subject, updating and expanding the
award-winning first edition published
in 1994. New photographs and technical drawings have been added and there
are two additional sections, covering
chimney and fireplace construction.
The BDA’s sponsorhip for this edition reaffirms its commitment to supporting the training of skilled bricklayers, and promoting good practice in
brickwork masonry.
Published by Arnold, the book is
available from booksellers and from the
BDA (ISBN 340 75899 6, price £16.99.
Plus postage and packaging at £3.50).
A black-tie gala dinner on Thursday 28
November at
London’s Café
Royal is the venue
for presentation of
the Brick Awards
2000.
Organised in association with the
Builder Group and judged by a distinguished panel of assessors, the
awards will identify, honour and celebrate the best in brickwork design
and craftsmanship.
Nomination forms are being distributed through the building press,
and are also available from the staff
of various brickcompanies.
Alternatively call the BDA (tel
01344 885651) for an entry form, or
download one directly from the BDA
website at www.brick.org.uk. The
final deadline for entries is Friday 1
September 2000.
3
Skill Olympics final
Second time around
A frequent subject of inquiry to the BDA
Technical Information Service is the use
of reclaimed bricks. These have an
undoubted appeal, particularly where a
mature and weathered appearance is
sought, though specifiers may not be
aware that new bricks can often achieve
the desired appearance at lower cost,
Envest for the
environment
ENVEST is a
new software
package from
BRE enabling
designers to estimate the lifecycle environmental impact
of a building
Wave power
4
The Wymering Wall in Portsmouth is a
massive artwork in brick, stone and
flint and is part of the Wymering Public
Art Project, whose recent opening
marked the fruition of four years of
while having the advantages of known
provenance, established technical performance and assured availability.
Architect Alison Norcross of the
BDA Technical Information Service has
prepared some guidance on the subject
and her document explores the aesthetic,
technical and economic issues.
It can be downloaded directly from
the BDA website at www.brick.org.uk.
Chris Armitage has returned from the
Olympics with a Diploma of
Excellence. His event was bricklaying
and the games in question were the
International Youth Skills Olympics
Montreal, held in Montreal last
November.
The challenge facing an international field of 17 competitors was an
exceptionally tough piece involving
intricate patterns of different colours
and shapes and entailing many individual cuts. Armitage came just outside
the medal category but was later presented by Baroness Blackstone with a
UK Skills Woodbine Parish Award.
This rewards the highest marks above
diploma level by a non medal winner.
The Irish representative took the gold.
from the early design stage. Alternative
schemes and materials can be compared
on the basis of ‘ecopoints’ (100 ecopoints being equivalent to the environmental impact of one UK citizen a
year). For more information e-mail
kapoor@bre.co.uk
Readers are reminded of BDA’s publication Brick for Life. This looks at
brick’s role in and impact on the environment and is available free of charge
from BDA.
artistic effort and the active involvement of the local community.
The Lottery funded project had its
origins in a proposed new multi-purpose community sports centre. Various
local artists were asked to respond to
its public arts potential and the result
reflects both their individual approaches and the input of local residents.
A physical boundary between the
new centre and the main road was
needed. Artist Peter Codling responded
with a wall that unfolds for 129m of
bending, coiling brickwork, creating
dynamic shapes from every angle. The
radii are tight – the 129m of wall is
compressed along a 90m boundary –
and called for expertise in manufacture
and bricklaying. So did the doublearchway gate with rope spiral columns
which mark the pedestrian entrance.
The brickwork, by local builders
Trevor Duke and Bradley Drackett, has
been singled out for praise.
This is a narrative wall: the bricks
are inscribed with community names,
dates and quotes inscribed by residents
before firing. The flints were from the
site, and a local collector donated the
fossils which are embedded in mortar.
The project was initiated by
Portsmouth City Council’s City Arts
and in partnership with the Wymering
Community Association.
Dr Susan Roaf
The challenge of creating
sustainable housing
1 The Oxford
Ecohouse: 48
photovoltaic panels
and four solar
heating panels are
installed on the
south-facing roof.
The house
produces only
140kg CO 2 a year
compared with a
comparable house
built to 1995
Building
Regulations, which
would produce
circa 6520kg a
year
2 Thermographic
image of the
Ecohouse in
autumn. Even with
200mm of
insulation in the
roof it is letting out
some heat
3 Thermographic
image of
neighbouring
house. Note
extreme thermal
bridging in the
structure at the
corners and air
leakage at eave
level. These two
images show the
importance of
careful detailing
4 Large
photovoltaic
installation in a
commercial
building, the Solar
Building, Doxfor d
International
Business Park,
Sunderland
An extended
version of this
article is available
on the BDA
website at
www.brick.org.uk
1
Dr Susan Roaf lectures
at Oxford Brookes
University, School of
Architecture and lives
in the Oxford Ecohouse
which she designed
D
oes sustainability have
implications for architectural
form? asked New Zealander
Peter Diprose in his doctoral thesis at
Auckland University. He concluded that
sustainability may have the potential to
create novel forms, but no one
‘sustainable’ aesthetic is likely to
emerge. Instead, a raft of responses will
emerge with elements reflecting the
broad range of issues the subject
entails.
These issues relate directly to
fundamental environmental challenges
facing us in the twenty-first century.
They include:
● Carbon dioxide emissions, the
greenhouse effect and climate change
● Ozone depletion
● Pollution
● Extinction of species and destruction
of habitat
● Population increase and development
● Resource depletion.
I believe we are capable of meeting
these challenges and have the tools and
knowledge to create sustainable
buildings. Solutions lie, not with HVAC
engineers or planners, but with
architects. Because the answer to the
question ‘is the building sustainable?’ is
always ‘it all depends’, and that is ‘on
5
the architecture’ – how the designer
deals with the issues noted above.
Let us not underestimate the
importance of buildings in the future of
the world. They consume around half
of all energy used in the developed
countries. The USA uses more than 40
per cent of all its generated electricity
on air-conditioning buildings. In
Britain, despite the fact that the number
of households has increased by 22 per
cent since 1970 and domestic energy
consumption has risen by 28 per cent,
annual CO2 emissions from British
houses have fallen by 21 per cent in the
same period. This has happened for a
number of reasons including increased
levels of energy efficiency and the ‘Dash
for Gas’ that has characterised British
patterns of energy use since the early
1970s, when gas became the preferred
fuel for the rapidly expanding central
heating industry. For equivalent energy
gas gives a third to a quarter less CO2
than electricity, because generating our
electricity is only between 25 per cent
and 36 per cent efficient.
Gas resources are depleting, but by
the time our reserves have dwindled the
solar revolution should enable us to
heat our homes and water by electricity
generated from the sun. We cannot rely
on oil, which is commonly thought to
have a total of around 50 easilyaccessible reserves left globally.
As designer and builder of the
Oxford Ecohouse I have learned firsthand the benefits of very low energy
bills. Since April 1995 gas bills for our
six-bedroom house have been about
£13.50 a quarter, and electricity bills
£10 a month (both exclude standing
charges). The house was built without
the aid of computer simulation, using
lessons learned from master builders
(modern and ancient) of the European
solar-design community and the Middle
East, where I lived for many years. Our
house has proved to have one of the
lowest energy consumptions in the UK,
hence one of the lowest environmental
impacts. It provides lessons that can be
transferred to future house designs.
The government has predicted the
need for 1.1 million new houses in the
South-east of England between 1996
and 2021. It will not matter if these are
built in high-density city sites, in
‘compact cities’, or on greenfield sites if
they are environmentally profligate.
What matters is that each has a
minimum environmental impact.
Key points for sustainable housing
6
Tony Mould, energy and environmental
consultant at Tweed Nuttal Warbuton,
has some key points to be considered in
creating sustainable housing.
Site: save natural habitats where
possible. Turn the building away from
2
3
biting cold winds. Shelter it with trees
and planting.
Orientation: align buildings with
main living and bedrooms within 15º
each side of south to save on heating.
Avoid houses shading each other from
sun.
Building form: minimise the surface
area of building to minimise heat loss.
Shade the building interior from the
high summer sun, especially from the
west where the hottest air temperatures
are combined with the low western sun.
Building envelope: be mindful of
exposure. Maintenance becomes an
issue in Life Cycle Costing analyses so
choose materials that do not need
frequent maintenance and repair. Brick
has an advantage, requiring only
minimum maintenance. At every main
entry point, provide a draught lobby,
porch, or sunspace to form an air lock
to control air movement into and out
of the building.
Insulation: choose insulation
materials for their environmental
benefits as well as their performance.
The thicker the insulation under the
floor, in walls and the roof, the warmer
the building will be in winter and the
cooler in summer. Design to minimise
cold bridging.
Detail design to reduce energy
leaks: decide the thermal resistance
appropriate to each building element.
The lower the U-value of an element
the better its resistance to heat transfer,
keeping the interior warm in winter
and cool in summer. All elements
cannot have equal thermal resistance,
but each should be the best of its kind.
Masonry construction is not always
airtight and detail design should
minimise air leakage. Supervision of
site work should ensure that details are
built as designed and that shortcomings
in construction do not prejudice
performance.
Ventilation: this is used to remove
stale air and odours and to heat and
cool buildings. Never use mechanical
ventilation where opening windows or
passive stack solutions can work,
because it uses extra energy. Natural
ventilation should be controlled – not
just haphazard air leakage.
Daylight: windows to the south
will catch the light, that can be used
deeper in the building via internal
windows to light internal spaces,
reducing the need for artificial lighting.
Building mass: lightweight
construction, such as a timber frame,
warms up and cools down quickly.
Buildings of heavy construction, for
example masonry, have more thermal
mass. The masonry acts like the bricks
in an electric storage heater, absorbing
heat when it is abundant and radiating
it again as the adjacent air temperature
drops. A passive solar building should
have well-placed thermal mass to act in
this beneficial way, assisting fuel
economy in winter and comfort
conditions in summer, and reducing the
magnitude of daily temperature
fluctuations.
Embodied energy and materials:
embodied energy is that used in the
manufacture and transport of material
to site. Specifying the most natural
products available with a minimum of
processing, and sourcing them as close
to the site as possible to minimise
transport impacts would seem to be
desirable, but consideration should also
be given to how long they will last and
what they will require in terms of
maintenance and renewal. Recent
studies consider not only embodied
energy of materials, but also the energy
used in their maintenance and
replacement over a 60 year service life
– which is what life-cycle costing is
based on. Durability and product life
are key factors in ensuring the
sustainability of building. Brick
performs well in this context, we know
it can last centuries and still look
beautiful.
Heating systems and controls:
choose the lowest energy, or CO2
emission, heating system available. The
greatest influence on the comfort of the
occupants of the building is the weather
and the use and control of the heating
system. The required heat output is
reduced by the thermal insulation of
the building fabric and by the heat
generated by solar gain and the
occupants and their equipment. With a
well-insulated building and thermal
mass placed correctly it is possible to
keep heating energy consumption to a
minimum.
Condensation: dampness in
buildings is frequently caused by
condensation of moisture from air of
high humidity on cold surfaces. Follow
three simple rules to avoid
condensation:
● Eliminate cold bridges from
construction as they introduce cold
surfaces internally on which moisture
condenses
● Provide ventilated air locks
such as front porches and rear
sunspaces where wet clothes and
damp washing can be hung to dry.
Use passive stack ventilation for the
kitchens and bathrooms which are
TIA conference on sustainable buildings for the twenty-first century
Buildings of the future will have to be robust, low-energy and sustainable. It is
an issue near the top of many agendas, the brick industry’s included. So the
BDA is pleased to align itself with the aims of an international teaching
conference at Somerville College, Oxford (9-12 July) and to sponsor the event.
TIA (Teachers in Architecture) has organised a programme of importance to
all professions involved in building design. It will cover design issues and tools,
teaching methodologies, and case studies from high-tech and low-tech to notech. A star-studded speaker programme includes Ken Yeang from Kuala
Lumpur, Baruch Givoni from Los Angeles and Steven Szokolay from Brisbane.
For details contact the conference coordinator at the School of Architecture, Oxford Brookes University.
tel 01865 483200 fax 01865 483298 e-mail tia@brookes.ac.uk
4
areas where high humidity is created.
● Use water-based paints on all
surfaces to enable moisture to be
absorbed into the building structure, so
preventing its build up in the internal
air of the house.
Water conservation: provide water
butts to collect rainwater and consider
greywater systems.
Solar water heating: in most years a
solar water heating system can provide,
free, between 50 and 75 per cent of the
annual hot water requirement of a
house.
Photovoltaics or solar electric
systems (PV): new houses can easily
accommodate 500W of PV panels on
south-facing roofs. This should cost
between £2000 and £2500 for multiple
systems, which can generate much of
the basic electricity requirement of the
house for 20-30 years.
Methods of measurement
Sustainable design requires that design
and construction waste should be
minimised, local communities be
included in developments and building
performance targets set and met. These
targets can include SAP ratings for
energy consumption. A SAP rating of
90 plus is not too ambitious a target to
achieve with sensible design. Another
target is the ‘Ecological Footprint’ of a
building. This is a more holistic tool
and measures a household against the
amount of land required to support its
lifestyle. It assesses transport, energy,
water, waste, house and garden and
purchasing. Another new tool is
‘Envest’, a very detailed and userfriendly programme designed for
evaluating the environmental impacts
of new housing; like BREEAM for
Housing it is produced by the BRE.
This is where the architecture
becomes of vital importance.
Everything noted above and more has
to be considered for twenty-first
century buildings. Aesthetically houses
can look however the client and the
architect decide, but they will have to
perform sustainably. We are in the new
age of performance-driven architecture
and, increasingly, this is what clients
will be demanding. What will the new
architecture look like? It doesn’t
matter. How will it perform? Very well
indeed.
7
ACADEMIC BUILDING
Chemistry class
Deborah Singmaster reports on an
exuberant new research facility at the
University of Bristol
Client
University of
Bristol
Project manager
and architect
Percy Thomas
Partnership
Structural, civil,
M&E engineer
Ove Arup &
Partners
Contractor
Wates
Construction
A new chemistry
building has given the
University of Bristol
top-grade facilities for
the industry’s next
generation of research
chemists. Despite a
brief driven by
technological as well
as health and safety
considerations, the
building is a striking
new landmark on the
Bristol skyline
Photography
STP
Photography
T
8
he £11.5 million Synthetic
Chemistry Research Laboratories
building at the University of
Bristol occupies a conspicuous hillside
site overlooking the city. Designed by
Percy Thomas Partnership with
engineer Ove Arup and Partners, it is
the product of an exacting and complex
brief, executed with a rapidity and
precision that invites comparison with
the building’s scientific function.
The laboratories, which were
opened by Sir Richard Sykes, the
chairman of Glaxo-Wellcome, are
modelled on those developed by the
pharmaceutical company at Stevenage;
they are key to ensuring that Bristol
continues to attract the best chemistry
staff and students, and to strengthening
the university’s relationship with
industry. Naturally, organisation and
fit-out of the internal spaces was the
client’s first priority and the architect
was given a relatively free hand with
the exterior design.
Matching and mixing
Project architect Neil Embleton ‘wanted
the building to be modern but at the
same time to be in touch with its
surroundings’.
The site curves westwards from the
existing 1960s School of Chemistry and
the new building is, in effect, an
extension. Its immediate neighbour is
the Queen’s (Engineering Faculty)
Building in brick and Bath stone, set
back from a Brandon stone rubble
retaining wall. Liver-red Brandon stone
is one of Bristol’s surprises. It is seen
everywhere, particularly in Victorian
structures but is no longer quarried; a
carefully sourced stone mix produced a
the lightweight GRP cornice is an
identical colour match. A decorative
brick band, in a soldier course pattern,
separates the two bottom string courses
and provides a mounting for light
fittings which uplight the brickwork at
night. The top floor has been stepped
back on this elevation, to lessen its
vertical impact and provide space for a
roof terrace with splendid views.
The long south elevation is
articulated by four projecting towers,
each one housing the office of the
lecturer serving the adjacent laboratory.
Corresponding towers on the north
elevation serve as equipment recesses
off the service corridor.
A collegiate interior
convincing substitute – used on the
base of the new building to great effect.
The architect wanted a slightly
brighter brick than that used on the
Queen’s Building. Unless bricks are
blended consistently by mixing from
packs on site as bricklaying proceeds,
unsightly banding can occur. To avoid
this, a computer-mixed multi-brick was
chosen. It was possible to specify the
exact shading and ensure consistency
between packs. The chosen
yellow/brown multi is used as a halfbrick skin tied back to a concrete frame
and blockwork inner leaf.
The only special-shaped bricks
required on the project were pistols cut
from standards to fit over stainless steel
supports, and cut and stuck doglegs for
oblique corners. Pre-mixed, pigmented
Designation (iii) mortar was used and
the stretcher bonded brickwork has
bucket-handle joints for neatness and
weather resistance.
Designing from the inside out
The awkward site and complex brief
dictated the internal lay-out: a clean
corridor to the south and a service
corridor to the north, with laboratories
spanning between. Ancillary spaces
such as offices and computer rooms are
at the west end of the plan, and a
terminal tower, or ‘prow’, containing
meeting rooms in the north west corner.
The 2.6m radius on the prow is the
minimum recommended for standard
bricks in stretcher bond. On the
internal wall of the clean corridor an
impressive 2.4m radius has been
achieved. The rough texture of the
brick face helps disguise any facetting.
Support for the radiused brick cladding
is provided by individual brackets fixed
to the framed structure at floor levels.
The west-facing elevation’s
composition of window shapes and
sizes is informal and includes portholes
set within self-supporting bullseyes
built from standard header bricks.
Visual unity is established by careful
detailing of precast string courses:
beneath each course, a single-brick
band of blue engineering bricks
provides a shadow gap (and also
disguises the presence of weep holes).
The precast string courses and window
dressings have a Bath stone finish, and
The brickwork theme continues inside
the building in the exposed walls of the
clean corridors, and with carpets,
timber doors and purpose-built
furniture, achieves an appropriately
collegiate atmosphere in the staff
offices, in contrast with the necessarily
more clinical finishes in the
laboratories. Curtain-wall glazing spans
between the towers, giving panoramic
views which can be enjoyed from the
main work spaces and particularly from
the low blue brick window seats. Piers
of matching blue bullnose engineering
bricks are also used at the entrance to
the fourth-floor bridge link into the old
building.
The roofline of the new laboratories
is probably the most dramatic in
Bristol, with its curved plant room
roofs – like ski pistes – topped by four
massive chimneys clad in spiralling lead
sheeting: yet planning permission was
obtained without delay or qualification.
Embleton believes that the choice of a
sympathetic brick cladding helped to
generate this favourable reaction to an
eclectic design which sprang from a
challenging site and a technologydriven brief.
9
HOUSING
Beveridge in Belfast
Student welfare is at the core of new
student housing. Joan Shannon re p o rt s
Client
The Queen's
University of
Belfast
Architect
Roger
McMichael
Architects
Main Contractor
Felix O'Hare
& Co
S t ru c t u r a l
Engineers
Kirk McClure
Morton
Landscape
Architect
John Williams
Photography
Anderson
McMeekin
Brickwork buildings
link with attractive
brick landscaping at
new student
residences in Belfast,
creating a village-like
environment with the
emphasis on
community
10
T
he Queen’s Elms halls of
residence for the Queen's
University of Belfast are situated
in parkland in a quiet residential area
off the Malone Road, close to the main
university campus. The most recent
development is Beveridge Hall, an
attractive village-like complex, built in
brick.
The hall was named after the late
Sir Gordon Beveridge, former vice
chancellor of the university. At the
naming ceremony the current vice
chancellor George Bain said: ‘It is most
fitting that this building has been
named Beveridge Hall. One of Sir
Gordon's priorities was the welfare of
students and he did everything in his
power to ensure their well-being.’
Community and privacy
For many students, living in hall
represents their first experience of living
away from home and student housing
can play a major role in easing the
transition from family living to full
independence. The Beveridge Hall design
centres on promoting both community
development and privacy: from the
community of external spaces, through
shared internal spaces, to the privacy of
individual bedsitting rooms.
Accommodation for the 354 students
is in 11 three-storey blocks of study
bedrooms on a multi-level site. Each
room has personal washing facilities and
access to a shared kitchen/dining room,
showers and WCs.
The blocks are built as structural,
for the buff brick and black for the darkblue facing brickwork) are re-echoed in
the external works where buff, blue and
red clay pavers create attractive areas.
Linear motifs are also provided in the
form of black metalwork features –
grilles across the lower part of the
ground-floor windows, cycle racks,
bollards, handrails and a decorative arch.
Paths and avenues
cellular, load-bearing brick and
blockwork masonry on strip or trenchfill foundations as expedient. Roofs of
grey-coloured concrete tiles accompany
gable walls topped with reconstituted
stone copings.
Sense of warmth
Extruded wire-cut clay bricks were
specified; a golden buff colour to
engender a sense of warmth for the
external spaces, in combination with
drag-faced, dark blue facings for the base
of walls and for accent features
elsewhere. The bricks are laid in stretcher
bond with the blue brick courses
projecting 10mm proud of the general
plane of buff facing brickwork.
Within the field of buff bricks above
the blue brick base of each building, two
courses of blues form a band to highlight
the ground-floor windows, in association
with the blue sill bricks. Seven single
courses of blue bricks spaced apart form
accent features to the windows and
corners of the first floor. And below the
second-floor windows, three courses of
blues form a band taken right around the
building. Dwarf walls and steps in the
complex reflect the colour combination
used in the building.
The texture and colour of the
brickwork go hand in hand with
decorative lines in a carefully considered
approach that integrates the new
buildings with the landscape. For
example, the mortar colours (dark red
The Queen’s Elms site is elegant
parkland, supporting many varieties of
mature shrubs and trees. Existing trees
were retained and supplemented with
new ones, shrubs and wall-climbing
plants, including various species of ivy.
When mature, they will soften the
appearance of the new buildings,
contributing to the creation of the
relaxed ambience of old-style, ivy
covered, academic halls.
The main avenue between the
principal buildings leads to a paved
terrace with wooded views to the south
beyond a stepped lawn. Paths pass
through spaces between the blocks,
providing connections within the
development and other parts of Queen’s
Elms. Car parking is provided at the
entrance to the site and so the avenue
between the blocks is closed to all except
emergency vehicles.
The car park is paved with tarmac
and clay pavers. A tarmac ‘road’ and
‘pavements’ of buff pavers, laid in
herringbone bond, are separated by blue
drainage-channel blocks. Buff pavers are
also used to emphasise the entrances to
the buildings.
Towards the far end of the main
avenue, circular paved patterns evolve
from the centre of a wide courtyard area.
Smaller circular patterns accentuate the
extremities of other paths within the site.
In each case the centre of the circle is
formed by dark-red pavers. Herringbone
pattern is used in both red and buff
pavers for the designs. The main bulk of
the pavers are buff, while the blue pavers
are used to form patterns of lines and as
a way to creat borders to the other
colours.
Architect Roger McMichael sees
brick ‘as a background to the paved and
planted character of the spaces between
the buildings, which contributes
extensively to the sense of community in
the village.’
The demands of the academic year
made it imperative that the construction
programme should not slip and, in fact,
the two-phase, £4.75 million
development was delivered to plan. The
architect paid tribute to the quality of
workmanship in Northern Ireland saying
‘I applaud the very good bricklaying and
paving squads here and the contractors
that supervised them. They took a pride
in their work.’
11
RETAIL BUILDING
Biker walls
George Demetri on Zen and the art of low
maintenance at Harley-Davidson
Client
FH Warr
& Sons
Architect
Cullum
& Nightingale
Contractor
Bickerton
Group
Structural
Engineer
Gifford
& Partners
Photography
Philip Bier
Bricks and sleek,
glossy new
motorcycles may seem
as different as chalk
and cheese. But a
recently opened
showroom shows how
complimentary
handmade bricks can
be when used to
express tradition,
function, durability
and sophistication.
A
n eye-catching red brick drum
has gone up just behind the
King’s Road in Chelsea. It
would have been two storeys taller, had
planning permission been forthcoming
for the construction of upper floors. As
it is, F W Warr & Sons had to be
content with a lower two-storey ovalshaped building as showroom and
offices for its flagship Harley-Davidson
motorcycle dealership. It can’t be too
disappointed however, given the spatial
attributes and enlightened mix of
materials specified by architect Cullum
& Nightingale on a building which is a
tremendous improvement on Warr’s
former accommodation.
Design
12
Opened in December last year, the new
£3 million building comprises a
showroom at ground-floor level with
office accommodation above. It is
attached to an existing workshop. The
option for extending the building
vertically is open, although at present
the roof is used for motorcycle storage.
The showroom is expressed on the
elevation by full-height glazing, broken
intermittently by brick-clad concrete
piers, while the office accommodation
above enjoys full-height, solid 215mm
brick walling punctured by windows.
The building’s dynamic elliptical
shape is a result of the architect’s desire
to maximise the corner site by
exploiting the full perimeter and
creating a building which is as visible
as possible from the King’s Road. This
has been achieved by creating a tall,
double-height showroom with a 5.5m
clear internal floor-to-ceiling height,
and by the use of eye-catching,
handmade, orange-red bricks both
inside and out. Chosen for their
glowing colour even in dull light they
seem to suggest a hint of warm
sunshine.
Construction
The construction is a bit of a hybrid,
with a concrete frame up to first-floor
level and from there up a steel frame to
make for easy connections, should
further floors eventually be added.
From a finishes point of view, the aim
was to match the legendary engineering
associated with the Harley brand and
to reflect what the architects considered
to be the key characteristics of a
Harley-Davidson motorcycle: a
sophisticated, functional and honest
expression of all parts, using the
highest quality materials.
Driven by a dislike of cavity wall
construction, the architects plumped for
solid 215mm brickwork throughout
which they feel has given numerous
benefits, such as the creation of more
satisfying reveals and associated
aesthetic and solar-shading properties.
Furthermore, the introduction of solid
brickwork in Flemish bond with its
alternating stretchers and headers could
more easily accommodate the variable
outer radius of the oval building
without recourse to special-shaped
radial bricks.
The faceted brick-clad concrete
columns extend well back into the
show room – there is a deep 1000mm
reveal. To demonstrate that brickwork
to the piers is purely cladding and not
structural, stack bonding has been
used, with bricks and brick slips tied
back to the concrete with steel ties and
mesh. Topped by reconstituted stone
cappings, the piers extend well above
the first floor level on the front
elevation, although this is purely for
visual effect, as the concrete frame
terminates at the level of the first floor
slab.
Brick, wood and concrete are the
main finishes in the showroom –
deliberately functional and unadorned.
Chosen for their low maintenance and
attractive ageing characteristics, the
effect can be described as sophisticated
rather than brutal. The warmth and
texture provided by the handmade
bricks form a startling contrast to the
extensive shiny, smooth chromework
on the motorcycles. The services and
vertical circulation core are expressed
partly by superbly finished bullnosed
concrete at either end and partly by a
central panel of 215mm thick floor-toceiling brickwork in Flemish bond.
The ultra-smooth finish to concrete
columns was achieved by using plastic
tubes as shuttering, while the fair-faced,
in-situ cast ceiling also provides
interest, thanks to its elaborate profile.
Similar to a folded plate-type structure,
it has provided an alternative solution
to downstand beams which would have
subdivided the soffit and destroyed the
spatial continuity of the showroom.
Viewed in section, the shallow triangles
are actually beams which become
deeper toward the service core wall.
The zigzag alternations provide
interesting junctions where they abut
the wall of the service core. Further
excitement will come when motorcycles
are suspended from the ceiling so as to
fully exploit the light and airy
showroom space.
The other main material of the
showroom is wood. It appears on the
floor as lacquered tongued and grooved
walnut, and was chosen on aesthetic
grounds and for its ability to withstand
the heavy weights of the bikes. More
auspicious are the highly polished,
walnut-topped sales counters – the
largest of which weighs over a tonne.
These monumental, highly polished
lumps of cantilevered wood are
supported on a chrome-finned structure
reminiscent of both motorcycle and
automobile radiators. This is not just
fortuitous; they double up as air
distribution grilles for the variable
volume displacement ventilation system
and contribute to controlling solar heat
gains through the tall glazed facade.
The latter uses a special glass designed
to reduce solar glare and external
reflections into the mainly west-facing
showroom.
Refinement, quality and excitement
are all manifest in this stylish new
showroom, making it a superb setting
for the glamorous icons of personal
transport on display.
13
PUBLIC BUILDING
Twisting tradition
Branson Coates has had fun with
brickwork at the Geffrye Museum.
Sutherland Lyall slopes of to investigate
Concept architect
Branson Coates
Executive architect
Sheppard
Robson
Structural
engineer
Alan Baxter
& Associates
Contractor
Kier London
Photography
Locations
Photography
14
The Georgian Geffrye
Museum in East
London has been given
a design twist with
Branson Coates’ new
extension. Its fabric
will reward close
observation
T
he Geffrye Museum has long
been a relatively unambitious
display of the way people have
lived over the centuries. Now it is the
client for a major extension from the
drawing boards of Branson Coates.
Despite a rocky design history it has
worked out and behind the modest
almshouse facades a few streets north
of fashionable Hoxton a spiralling wall
of brick uncoils from a hidden garden.
It’s round the back of the former
almshouses which make up the Geffrye
Museum in London’s Hackney, an
elongated two-storey brick horseshoe
with a low pitched roof. It provides the
museum with much needed additional
exhibition space – and a modestly
sensational pavilion in its rear garden.
Sunk into the garden and separated
from it by a continuous sunken area,
the glass and metal cladding of the
lower level is protected by a sloping
skirt of sunscreens attached to the base
of a stepped concrete edge beam
curving around the perimeter of the
first level slab. On the north side this
skirt merges into the roof of a sloping
ramp which rises to ground level and a
glazed café area which also serves as
the link with the Georgian main
building. Inside, the first floor is a
curving exhibition space with a
bookshop at one end and a kitchen plus
café at the other linking to the old
building. At ground/basement level are
education rooms, a workshop and a
design centre accessed by a dramatic
15
curving staircase at the core of the
building’s curve.
There’s something odd about the
curving exterior – and then you get it.
The Flemish bond brickwork, of firstquality multi stocks made from a
Sussex clay, is laid in spiralling courses.
There is a bit of optical confusion
because the wall is a big one but the
defining clue is given by the stepped
supporting edge beam. In fact the slope
is one in 12 and derives from the slope
of the ramp.
Thick thermal flywheel
16
You can tell from the occasional
opening that this external wall is a very
thick one. In fact there is a 215mm
inner leaf, a 250mm cavity with
180mm of insulation and then a
215mm outer leaf. The wall is a thick
one because it was decided to use the
structure as a thermal sink in order to
iron out temperature differences. The
inner leaf, which is mostly plastered,
has reinforced-brick piers at six to eight
metre centres. They are a brick and a
half on side with a steel rod down the
middle tied back to the supporting slab
and filled with concrete. The function
of these piers is to support roof trusses
and provide overall restraint for the
upper parts of the structure – and to
restrain the inner and outer brickwork
of the wall. Although the outer wall is
actually a continuous 80m long piece of
brickwork, it was treated by the
engineers as a series of panels spanning
between the positions of the internal
piers. It is at these points that the outer
wall is tied back to the piers by fishtail
ties slotted into vertical steel channels.
These are supported by substantial
stainless steel flats acting as both struts
and ties protruding through the
insulation from their fixing points in
the mortar beds of each pier. The inner
leaf of the walls was built
conventionally off the concrete slab –
the sawtooth lintels actually extend
under the cavity and the external leaf
and have vertical drain holes.
As Alan Baxter engineer Nick Ling
explains: ‘It’s not really a cavity wall,
more accurately it’s an internal skin of
structural brickwork with piers and a
brick cladding which gains some of its
stability from the ties at the pier
positions. We adopted the fishtail-andchannel approach because with
standard horizontal mortar beds on the
internal wall and sloping courses on the
outer you could never be sure you
could line up the ties. We considered a
number of possibilities including
standard ties but this was the simplest
and most buildable.’
Eliminating expansion joints
The stepped edge beam supporting the
outer leaf is actually a connected set of
precast sawtooth lintels hanging off the
edge of the first floor slab. With
900mm long steps it was possible to set
out the brickwork above very
accurately. The designers were very
anxious that there should not be any
expansion joints so the mortar is a
1:2:9 (cement:lime:sharp sand) mix laid
as standard 10mm thick joints. Alan
Baxter has some experience with
structural brickwork and lime mortars
and, as Ling explains ‘There were little
special features such as not having
damp proof membranes – except at the
position of the access ramp. This means
the wall will not slide laterally and will
encourage a build-up of little cracks,
which will be distributed across the
whole wall. Because the mortar is
weak, small cracks will be repaired by
the leaching of the lime.’
Wilful?
Doug Branson of design architect
Branson Coates says, ‘We always
thought to do the building in brick.
And we resisted the temptation to do it
completely differently. The question we
asked was, how do you take a
traditional material and give it a twist?
And that is literally what we did.
‘The spiralling courses actually give
a sense of movement as the block goes
round the corner,’ says Branson. People
have said to us that we were being
which, says Branson, ‘was beautifully
built by main contractor Kier’s people’.
Holes in the wall
naughty. But you find this kind of
brickwork in places like, say, the
Barbican’s ramps. And if you look a the
Victorian buildings opposite you see
lots of examples of brickwork
following the line of the structure – and
no-one says that this is particularly
wilful.’
There was a point during the
examination of cost implications when
it looked as though the sloping
brickwork might have to go but the
cost analysis showed that it was very
little more expensive than standard
brickwork. As it was, the brickies were
apparently sorry to finish the project –
The sloping courses and the unusual
680mm thickness of the wall produce
some interesting details at openings.
The logic of the sloping beds calls for
sloping window and door heads
following the line of the brick courses.
And that is exactly what the architects
designed. With reveals a brick and a
half deep and traditional flat arches
with special rubbers, the openings are
unusually satisfying – although it
turned out that in the cost review it
became necessary to do openings with
concealed concrete lintels and brick
slips. This was also the case with the
big arched openings in the two gable
end walls. Branson is philosophic. It
would have been better to have used
traditional construction, but this ends
up looking just about right. There’s an
oddity, you might think, in the fact that
although it costs less to do a replica
version, a replica takes a lot more
effort and cutting and work and
detailing than it does to deploy the
time-honoured method.
17
PRIVATE HOUSE
A river runs through it
An assertive new house on the Thames
has caused a few ripples. Sue Duncan
enjoys the view
Client
Jeremy Paxton
Architect
Adrian James
Architects
Consulting
Engineer
Alan Barnes
Consulting
Engineers
Contractor
G Cox
Builders
Brickwork
Contractors
Fusion
Brickwork
Contractors
Photographs
Locations
Photography
Ballihoo, a new
family home on the
Thames, sits on
masonry piers
which are more
than muscular –
they may have done
weight training. Its
innovative design
radically
re-interprets
boathouse
architecture while
developing the
potential of brick
and steel structural
solutions
18
B
allihoo makes heads turn. Sited
on the Oxfordshire bank of the
River Thames at Caversham and
visible from Caversham Bridge, from
the towpath on the Berkshire side and
from passing river craft, it is an
assertive and dramatic new presence.
For the owners the views are
impressive, too. From the first-floor
living room, huge picture windows give
a grandstand view of river traffic and
superb vistas up and down river and
over the Thames floodplain.
Ah yes, the floodplain. Despite the
narrowness of the site, which rises from
a narrow level strip by the river up a
steep bank to a road at the rear, there
was no question of major
encroachment onto the floodplain. That
the site could be built on at all stems
from an established residential use. An
inhabited boathouse had been on the
1ha site for over 30 years and Reading
Borough Council, the local authority,
was prepared to permit a new dwelling
which was innovative but still in
character with the river setting.
Precedent helped with the Environment
Agency too, which granted a license to
overhang the river by the same distance
as the previous building.
The lifestyle brief was for a modern,
flexible home for an active young
family, exploiting the river setting and
giving easy access to the water. The
design responds to the brief and to the
site constraints by taking the building
off the ground and over the water.
A re-interpretation of the decorated
boathouse archetype, it stands on six
pairs of massive piers which support
the steelwork frame, the focal firstfloor accommodation and full-width
balcony, cantilevered out over the river
and large boatdock. The pitched, tileclad timber roof has deeply overhanging
eaves, producing a floating effect.
From enclosure into openness
From the road entrance approach,
Ballihoo reveals its surprises only
gradually. A wooden fence screens the
garden from public view and only a
deeply recessed front door pierces the
gable wall forming the entrance
elevation, generating a modest, chapellike appearance.
The sequence is one of enclosure
and darkness, progressively opening out
to light and lateral views. The axial
route from the street entrance to the
piano nobile leads past the kitchen,
utility room and stairwell before
expanding into the large, open-plan
living area arranged around a central
fireplace. Light floods into this
magnificent space through full-height
windows on the three aspects. The
south window opens onto the full
width of the site, 4.5m above the river.
The ground-floor is raised 1.3m off
the ground with a 1m high void below
to allow floodwaters unimpeded
passage across the site. A stepped
bridge from the stair hall gives access
to the rear of the boat dock. The back
wall retains the steep bank at the rear
of the property and a separate twostorey garage and games room is also
built into the bank.
Masonry piers
James’ original design concept involved
a large steel frame with a cantilever
deck. However, with the lateral wind
load anticipated, this would have
entailed too cumbersome a frame –
hence the masonry pier solution. These
simple and powerful verticals are set on
concrete-filled steel drum piles in the
alluvial clay and carry the steel
members, which are expressed at first
floor and second floor levels.
The 6.7m high columns, in brickfaced loadbearing blockwork, are 1m
deep x 1.7m wide at their base,
reducing via successive plinth details to
1.1m wide at roof level.
A former associate of John Outram,
James is alive to the innovative
potential of brickwork. A blend of
orange-red stock bricks was chosen as
the main brick, with blue engineering
bricks for the first few courses in the
piers, which seem to ground them to
the riverbank. It’s a formula altogether
sympathetic to Reading’s brickwork
tradition, but in a modern, stripped-
down manifestation. Little is allowed to
detract from the rhythm, drama and
sculpted quality of the piers. Openings
are marked with projecting double
creasing tiles, with brick on edge at
heads and with canted brick sills. The
brickwork was not without challenges
for the bricklayers – particularly with
the setting out for each pier: there was
a mere 3mm tolerance.
Ballihoo has made this stretch of
river more exciting, but it also had to
meet more workaday requirements.
Despite the large window expanse, a
SAP rating of 97 has been achieved
through a combination of southerly
aspect, double-glazing, the thermal
mass of the masonry, efficient
insulation and a condensing boiler. U
values for the brick walls are 0.27, and
for the roof 0.21.
Ballihoo should stand the test of
time and whatever the river itself can
throw at it – James is extremely keen to
see the Thames floodwaters rise high
enough to batter against those giant
columns. And lose the fight.
19
STRUCTURAL BRICKWORK
A civil answer
Peter Watt reports on a scheme which
looks to the future, while harnessing
brickwork’s traditional strengths
Client and
Engineer
Kent County
Council then
Medway
Council
Planning and
Transport
Directorate
Main
Contractors
Christiani &
Nielsen and
May Gurney
Joint Venture
Peter Watt is
Senior
Structural
Engineer at
BDA
20
An important new civil
engineering scheme in
Kent demonstrates
how the imaginative
use of brickwork can
benefit both
infrastructure and
built environment. It
also disposes of a few
misconceptions,
showing that bricks
with medium to high
water absorbency and
moderate compressive
strength can meet
structural brickwork
requirements
T
he Gillingham Northern Link is
Phase Two of the Medway
Towns Northern Relief Road, a
major transportation improvement
project, Phase One of which was a new
road tunnel under the River Medway.
The new 3km relief road forms the
A289 bypassing Chatham and
Gillingham, linking with the New
Medway Tunnel and also with the
historical Chatham Docks and
Maritime areas. Built to dual
carriageway standard, it is part new
construction and part upgrade of the
existing highway infrastructure.
Work commenced on Gillingham
Northern Link in late 1997 with site
preparation and drainage installation.
Principal access and structures were
1 Part of new north wall
with planter area. This and
the south wall are both par t
free-standing and part earth
retaining brickwork
structures
2 Earth retaining wall stems
to north and south. Walls
are of reinforced grouted
cavity brickwork with
reinforced brick piers
3 View of south wall
showing approach ramp to
pedestrian over-bridge.
Both north and south walls
are about 1km long with
free-standing parts up to
3m high above finished
ground lines
4 Detail of arch to north
wall pedestrian over-bridge
approach ramp
5 Head detail to north wall.
Although showing English
bond format this freestanding wall is collar
jointed in parts using precut snap headers
6 Brickwork cladding to
pedestrian over-bridge
approach ramp along the
north wall. Both spandrels
and soffits are brick clad to
match the main walling
structures
1
built mainly between the summer of
1998 and the following spring. The road
and full access to the new tunnel were
opened to public traffic in June 1999.
Brickwork structures
The Medway Towns have a long
historical tradition, and brickwork in
buildings and in infrastructure plays a
major role in the vernacular. A
significant part of the link road passes
through historically sensitive old
dockyard and maritime areas which
boast some very fine free-standing
boundary walls in brick that have stood
for well over 100 years. Some of these
are very substantial structures.
Similar boundary walls can also be
seen in the towns of Gillingham and
Chatham and many are constructed
around former naval facilities in the
area. For these reasons the choice of
new brickwork structures for the
Gillingham Northern Link formed part
of complementary planning decisions.
The good durability and low
maintenance factors associated with
brickwork construction were also
influential in the choices made.
The two principal brickwork
walling structures in the scheme are the
north and south boundary walls, which
meet the new Medway Tunnel slip
roads. The north wall runs adjacent to
the Chatham Docks and Maritime areas
and is about 1km in continuous length.
It complements and integrates with
existing dockyard walling, parts of
which are retained as fully serviceable
construction. The 1km long south wall
is entirely new.
Both walls are built as part earthretaining, part free-standing brickwork
walling structures, the earth retaining
function being required because of level
differences at the carriageway edges.
Like their older counterparts they are
substantial structures. In parts of the
north wall for example, the earth
retaining section starts 2m below
ground: above ground free-standing
elements can rise up to 3m high above
finished ground level.
Earth retaining wall stems are
formed mainly of reinforced grouted
cavity brick construction with a typical
overall wall stem thickness of 300mm.
The free-standing wall stems are
Demolishing a few misconceptions
constructed using mainly 215mm thick
unreinforced brickwork in English
bond but collar jointed with tie systems
rather than bonded through, a
technique which helps achieve fair
faced brickwork on both sides of a wall
when using stock bricks. Piers are
provided to strengthen the taller freestanding structures of the north wall.
The simplicity of the structural
brickwork forms used enabled rapid
on-site construction and the brickwork
was completed to schedule despite bad
weather which continued while most of
the principal walling was being built.
In addition to the north and south
walls the Gillingham Northern Link
includes a number of less substantial
free-standing and earth-retaining brick
wall structures at various locations. In
many cases the height of these walls is
less than 1.5m and economical, fully
structural solutions have been provided
by mass brickwork walling, of 215mm
or 328mm stem thickness. Earth
retaining planter walls also use this
form of mass brickwork construction,
providing beneficial environmental
aspects to the link road.
Brickwork is also deployed as
cladding to other structural forms and
features. Abutments to pedestrian and
railway over-bridges are of reinforced
concrete clad in single 102mm
thickness brickwork. The approach
ramp to one pedestrian bridge has been
executed as a series of increasing radii
arches with both arch spandrels and
soffits being fully brick clad to match
the aesthetics of the overall scheme.
The majority of both structural and
cladding brickwork has been built in
stock brickwork using a pre-blended
mix of 15 per cent yellow and 85 per
cent red stock bricks to match old
existing walling. The use of a moderate
compressive strength brick unit with
higher than 7 per cent water absorption
demonstrates that major brickwork
free-standing and retaining wall
structures do not rely upon the
use of high strength, low water
absorption clay bricks to achieve
adequate structural and durability
performance.
Damp proof courses in walls have
been formed using low water
absorption bricks in a Designation (i)
mortar as an integral part of wall
stems, thus avoiding the need for
separate (and structurally disruptive)
sheet damp proof courses in structural
walls. Detailing to the head of the
north wall is flush, using special shaped
brick capping, again in sympathy with
existing brickwork.
Gillingham Northern Link
demonstrates the benefits to the
built environment when a major
civil engineering project exploits
both the aesthetic and structural
possibilities of brickwork. When
used to its full structural potential,
brickwork can help achieve
highly competitive and economic
walling solutions. It also provides
an original and attractive alternative
to conventional approaches, while
enhancing the built environment.
2
3
4
5
6
7
21
HOUSING
Sub-urban Gorbals
Frank Arneil Walker reviews
award-winning housing in Glasgow
Client
New Gorbals
Housing
Association
Architect
Phase 2
Page & Park
Architects
Architect
Phase 3
Elder &
Cannon
Main Contractor
John Dickie
Construction
Photography
David
Churchill
The design of Moffat
Gardens, one more
enclave in the
progressive
transformation of
Glasgow’s Gorbals,
brought together an
adventurous housing
association, concerned
local residents and
three of the city’s
leading architectural
practices. The project
sets a new standard
for collaborative
creativity questions
just how urban
regeneration of urban
areas should be
T
he old Gorbals was black.
Ordered streets of four-storeyed,
stone tenements charred with the
polluted smoke of Victorian industry.
The not-so-old Gorbals of the 1960s
was grey. Slabs and towers of concrete,
brutally big and as brutally bare,
indiscriminately scattered (or so it
seemed to the pedestrian) on the tabula
rasa of comprehensive redevelopment.
The new Gorbals is red – and cream.
Brick terraces back to street scale. But
is it urban? Perhaps it is too early to
say, for Glasgow’s second resurrection
south of the river is still only
beginning. But the signs are good, the
potential recognised recently by the
Saltire Society’s awards to two related
housing projects added to the new
brick world across the Clyde.
Moffat Gardens
22
Moffat Gardens is part of the
regeneration programme for East-
Gorbals where the New Gorbals
Housing Association, founded in the
early 1990s, is building on a number of
derelict cleared sites. The achievement,
largely funded by Scottish Homes, is
considerable. First, a masterplan was
prepared. Stimulated by its enterprising
director, Fraser Stewart, the association
entered into discussions with members
of the local community. What emerged
as a priority was a desire to avoid the
monotony and repetitive boredom of
the 1960s and 70s. Consequently the
plan devised by Page & Park Architects
envisaged a variety of housing types
and the creative involvement of several
architectural practices. Their cooperation would not be limited to the
design of particular housing blocks but
would extend to collaboration on the
choice of materials and forms and,
significantly, to decision-making
affecting the design of the public spaces
unifying the overall layout.
Like most other areas of Gorbals,
the site at Moffat Gardens had all but
lost its urban coherence. Some twoand three-storey housing had already
been built to the south and west while
a small factory and a single-storey
public house had survived the
ubiquitous demolition. The
association’s plan introduced three new
housing blocks, arranging these in a coordinated relationship which reinforced
the street grid, re-established three- and
four-storey scale, and created a small
park at the centre of what is a
deceptively simple rectilinear layout.
Two of the three blocks were completed
in early summer 1998. Page & Park has
laid a strong three-storey wall of
terrace housing (Phase Two) along
Hayfield Street, toughening the urban
edge of the site opposite the open park.
In the park itself, Elder and Cannon
provided what it describes as a ‘villa
block’, a three- and four-storey building
of flats (Phase Three) standing alone
south of Hayfield Street. Yet to be
completed, the third element in this
collaborative composition is a clever
aggregation of street ranges (Phase
One) designed by Simister Monaghan
Architects to mark the North-west
corner of the Moffat Gardens site.
Brick wall – street wall
Fundamental to the urban intention of
the whole project is the ‘wall’ of
housing along Hayfield Street. This
incorporates 21 two-, three- and fourperson flats, most of which look south
across the street to the park. The wall
is of red wire-cut bricks with a
rusticated texture chosen to maintain
design decisions already made in earlier
neighbouring projects, their planar
consistency of colour intensified here
by matching pointing and a total
abstinence from any kind of patterning
or decorative detail. This principal
elevation is, however, indented at
several points to create balconies; some
merely hole-in-the-wall, but two which
are recessions rising through two
storeys to the overhanging eaves of the
monopitch roof. These inner planes are
lined with silvering western red cedar
boarding which runs horizontally with
the brick coursing. This layering of the
facade has been exploited
asymmetrically to relate to the park
opposite and undoubtedly adds shadow
interest, material change and
proportional intrigue to the street wall.
Windows, painted a dull battleship
grey, exert a regular underlying rhythm
along the wall but the seeming
arbitrariness of indentation and change
of material remains troubling, somehow
less than urban, while the sparred soffit
of the tilted jutting eaves is already a
cliché.
Brick returns at the ends of the
street block but is progressively peeled
away as public space becomes private.
Cream-coloured render is used on the
rear elevation, though here, too, some
cedar boarding provides relief. The
monopitch roof dipping to the rear
reduces the scale appropriately and
allows some variation in ceiling heights
in the cross section. But the large
overhang to the north, impairing the
light quality in the second-floor
bedrooms, seems again an unfortunate
surrender to questionable architectural
fashion.
Tenement in the park
While the unfinished corner housing
across Moffat Street from the west end
of Page & Park’s terrace will add more
street ranges to the new red brick
Gorbals, Elder & Cannon’s tenement in
the park does not. Its open space
location, with only minimal obligation
to respond to the lines of Hayfield
Street and McNeil Street, required –
and received – something completely
different. Fourteen two- and threeperson flats are housed in a freestanding villa block of two elements – a
four-storey ‘tower’, elliptical in plan,
linked to a three-storey oblong wing.
The curving north and south walls of
the ellipse are built in buff bricks, a
change of colour from the dominant
red but one justified by the special
nature of this object building and
indeed by the nearby use of similar
bricks in a secondary role to the red. At
the east and west ends, where the ends
of the ellipse have been snipped off, the
living rooms are fully glazed. Raised
over the third floor, which has been
copper-lined above sill height to detach
it visually from the brick below, is a
daring elliptical slab of a roof. It too is
copper-clad, oversailing walls and
glazing – a strange chocolate nougat
wafer pressing down on the creamy
brick below. To the south is the lower
block, sensibly reduced in height to
relate to neighbouring housing. Render
dominates in this three-storey wing, a
piece of design which in itself is
persuasively redolent of the 1930s.
Sub-urban success
In almost every way Moffat Gardens is
an exemplary success. It testifies to the
value of consultation with the local
community. It shows what a forceful
enlightened client can achieve. It proves
that leading architects in the city can
compete and collaborate creatively.
Above all it creates a place, distinct and
pleasurable. If there is still rather more
space than place in these open streets,
perhaps it is because in a shrinking city
the new Gorbals must inevitably
become sub-urban.
23
HOUSING
1
New East Enders
George Demetri reports on two new
faces of Docklands housing
Developer
Bellway
Homes
Architect
Robert
MacDonald
Associates
Contractors
Bellway
Homes
(Poplar)
Bovis
Crowngap
(Limehouse)
Structural
Engineers
Nicholls
Roach
McMahon
(Poplar)
Clarke
Nicholls
Marcel
(Limehouse)
Photography
Locations
Photography
Two new plush
residential
developments in
London’s Docklands
demonstrate the
important contribution
of facing brickwork in
modern construction
and the stunning
effects that patterning
can achieve
2
1,2 Limehouse Basin
3,4 Poplar Dock
5 Limehouse Basin
T
wo private-sector housing
developments in the flourishing
Docklands area of London
provide ample proof not only of the
effectiveness of patterned brickwork
but also just how exciting brick can be
when used in a contemporary idiom.
Architect Robert MacDonald
Associates has shown that the planar
crispness so admired in modern
architecture can be created as
effectively by brick as it can by
steel, concrete and glass. Furthermore,
in addition to its thermal and
maintenance benefits, this so-called
‘traditional’ material can provide
striking contrasts with the more
modern upstarts.
Bellway Homes was the developer
for the schemes, one at Limehouse
Basin, the other at the Boardwalk in
Poplar Dock. Both are blocks of flats,
topped by the inevitable penthouses.
Concepts
24
The architect’s desire to provide an
expression of modern building
techniques has led to the almost
universal use of stretcher bond,
extending even to the clay-paved areas.
The desire for an abstract as opposed
to a traditional richness has produced a
form of construction which does not
make use of soldier courses and other
typical brickwork details. This results
in what the architect considers to be a
clean, unfussy effect which also
provided savings in construction time.
The resulting horizontality is
accentuated in certain areas by
alternating courses of yellow and bright
red stock bricks, an effect which is a
real delight even when used on multistorey panels. Because the banding
breaks up the surface, any colour
discrepancies in each brick type are
harder to discern. Why are such
simple means of articulating large
planes of brickwork not used more
commonly? On the down side,
wandering perpends become more
noticeable. Yet even this is not an
unattractive sight – for anyone wanting
to snuggle up to the brickwork and
gaze skywards.
3
4
unsightly horizontal movement joints
provided at every storey where steel
angles support the brickwork at
concrete edge beams.
Limehouse Basin
5
Construction
Both developments have broadly
similar underlying constructions
comprising flat-roofed, concreteframed, masonry-clad structures of
varying heights with steel and glass
balconies. A typical wall construction
comprises a 140mm block inner leaf,
78mm partially filled insulated cavity
and a 102mm outer brick leaf, all
achieving a respectable U-value of 0.36.
All internal wall surfaces (including
party walls) have been dry-lined.
Striped brickwork – partly inspired
by a pub in Kentish Town Road, North
London – is common to both schemes,
but is by no means all-pervading, as
there are also substantial areas of buff
stocks which contrast both with other
brickwork and with other materials. At
Limehouse, smooth blue engineering
bricks are used at lower levels, in some
places as plinths and in others as walls
to service areas and external stairs.
Movement joints seem to be
generous throughout. A further benefit
of stripey brickwork is that it provides
excellent camouflage for what can be
This development comprises six multistorey blocks clustered around a marina
on a site bounded by Horseferry Road
and Branch Road. All are crowned by
steel and glass penthouses with
dramatic overhanging eaves. What
strikes one immediately is the richness
of colour, material and textural
combinations pervading the entire
scheme. The massing of the various
blocks is enlivened by planes of vibrant
coloured brickwork abutting sheets of
vertical glazing which give way to
planes of coloured render. Square
windows have been used throughout as
an ordering element.
The architect has employed different
treatments to express the various
volumes, provide visual interest and
help break down the scale of the
development. This plurality of colour
and texture is continued on horizontal
surfaces, resulting in a hierarchical
treatment of landscape from public to
semi-public space. Buff clay pavers
around the marina give way to concrete
setts and finally to crisply laid creamy
concrete flags edged by off-white gravel
immediately in front of the main
entrances to the blocks. The effort
expended in creating such detailed
landscaping is justified by the likely
scrutiny of residents gazing down from
their windows and balconies.
One of the reasons for clustering
the blocks around the marina was to
provide as many flats as possible with
views over Docklands and the
surrounding regions. Steel and glass
balconies are used throughout for this
purpose. However, the architects’ desire
to recreate the industrial warehouse
aesthetic, so much a part of the area,
has resulted in a gridwork of dark,
foreboding steelwork balconies
superimposed over some of the marina
elevations which add a heavy, sombre
note to what is otherwise a rich and
lively development.
The Boardwalk, Poplar
The apartment blocks at the Boardwalk
development beside Poplar Dock are
arranged in a more urban configuration
than those at Limehouse. There is also
a greater emphasis on low-rise
development inherited from the density
requirements of the former London
Docklands Development Corporation.
The three-storey townhouses with buff
brickwork and Georgian panelled front
doors sit rather incongruously amid a
generally bold, confident and colourful
contemporary development.
The three-storey perimeter blocks in
Trafalgar Way face Billingsgate Market,
and Canary Wharf looms on the
horizon. Yet for a split second you
might think you were in Rotterdam, so
strong are the Dutch references on
these elevations, with a touch of de Stijl
here and a just a hint of Mondrian
there. Sculptural forms are broken
down into elemental planes using
varying materials, colours and textures.
Thus, the striped brickwork on one side
is balanced by a rich, earthy, redrendered plane on the other, both
separated by a chasm of dark steelwork
balconies against a bright yellow
background.
Detractors may scoff at what they
might construe as an exercise in
facadism applied over both sites. Yet
even if this were true, the ends have
certainly justified the means, with both
the East End developments in both
Limehouse and Poplar achieving
some very attractive environments in
which to live.
25
PUBLIC BUILDING
Stage presence
A bemused Sutherland Lyall reports on
a new theatre where brick is centre stage
Client
Contact
Theatre
Architect
Short and
Associates
Structural
engineers
Modus
Sustainability and ecodesign have become
serious issues in
architecture – and
have begun to provide
a kind of rationale for
new ways of designing
form. Brick has an
important part to play
in this movement
Mechanical and
electrical
engineer
Max Fordham
& Partners
Contractor
Ballast
Wiltshier
Photography
Positive Image
A
26
lan Short, architect and
professor at de Montfort
University, claims that ‘our
buildings are getting heavier.’ His most
recent completed work following his
Queen’s building at de Montfort is the
refurbishment and expansion of the
Contact Theatre in Manchester.
You’re driving up Manchester’s
Oxford Road and you’ve almost got
through the university quarter when
you skid to a halt because over there on
the right beyond a recently cleared-out
square is this extraordinary sight. A
pale brick, three- or four-storey ramble
of a building with a kind of apron
down one of the front facades in waves
of overlapping metal sheeting and,
balancing precariously 40m up above,
this amazing jumble of dislocated brick
chimney things. You think
Expressionism, maybe Steiner, maybe
terminal, total paroxysmal mode before
letting such an extraordinary show to
go ahead.
But yes they did and here it is and
what can anyone possibly make of it?
There is more rooftop fun with a row
of crenellated zinc-clad chimney-style
structures marching at an angle of 45º
across the back of the building. This
latter assemblage is actually above the
heavily refurbished sixties theatre
which follows the orthogonal layout of
the streets. Short says he would have
preferred brick for these roof structures
too but the old theatre roof had not
been designed to take that kind of load.
To the left in front of the old
theatre is an office and rehearsal block
whose lower section involves a
complicated screen of brick and
somewhat Steineresque precast-concrete
detailing behind which is an external
staircase to the first floor. Fronting the
lower adjacent block (with three
conventional dormers jutting up
beyond the eaves) are four single-storey,
perforated brick sheds with outrageous
peaked roofs. Over on the right beside
the zinc waves is a brick cylinder
containing a staircase with lavatories
and storage rooms in its core.
Sustainability
You look a bit harder at the chimney
assemblage and it begins to make a
kind of visual sense. The slender
unreinforced brick supports rise from a
curving stripped-baroque base and
there are metal struts and ties holding
the mass of overhead brick together. It
is, argues Short, to do with the
practice’s affection for Viollet-le-Duc
and his casual mixing of traditional and
cutting edge construction methods –
and the sympathetic know-how of
engineer Steve Morley. It turns out that
the great brick array in the sky, like the
zinc-clad array on the roof slanting
away to the left, is a series of
interlinked H-shaped pot-style
ventilators. For this is a building whose
design is predicated to a fairly high
degree on its non-mechanical
environmental conditioning.
Fast
Ton Albers, perhaps Michael Hopkins
and his vast chimneys opposite Big Ben
and at Nottingham – and of course
Alan Short a couple of years ago at de
Montfort university. For this is the
work of his office.
Expressive
The overlapping zinc sheeting reminds
you simultaneously of half-stripped
theatre billboards waiting for the
elaborately edited reviews for the next
shows – and those big, painted tin faces
you find as entrances to Lunar Parks all
over the world. But never before have
you seen anything like those gigantic,
crazy, chimney structures tottering up
there in the sky. This is England. This is
England under the planning system
yoke and you find yourself astonished
that the planners didn’t go into
With conventional conditioning you
pump air in from outside through,
depending on the sophistication of the
system, washers and filters and heating
and cooling elements. You then
distribute it through ducts or plenums
to the working spaces and exhaust it
back to the outside via, say, ceiling
ducts. All the ducts can be quite small
because the fans push the air along at a
relatively high speed. However, air
handling costs a lot and if there is not a
dedicated building management and
27
seven or so storeys in the direction of
the prevailing wind. The stack principle
works with very low pressure
differences and if it is reversed you can
get into trouble: serious trouble as we
discovered when we saw the results of
wind-tunnel testing by the Welsh
School of Architecture.’
Brick interiors
Although the zinc waves down the
front elevation are attention grabbing,
you enter the building by marching up
to the facade and then turning sharp
left through an airlock of conventional
glass doors leading to the box office
and then the café. Stairs lead up to the
lobby of the main theatre, a lift takes
you up to the studio theatre and
rehearsal space. Although the building
is labyrinthine there is no especial
reason why a theatre complex should
not, in time-honoured fashion, be
exactly that.
There is quite a lot of brickwork
internally with some dramatic curving
upper walls around the main theatre
lobby. The building relies on heavy
internal masonry to maintain thermal
stability. Here Short has used calciumsilicate bricks. He’s a real enthusiast –
particularly because of their precision
and their range of colours. It needs to
be said that these features are only
partly supported by the reality. Because
the joints are raked quite deeply and
the individual bricks are so sharp
edged, you immediately notice any
irregularity in bricklaying.
Brick exteriors
maintenance team, environmental
conditioning systems can go wrong. In
the old Contact Theatre there was a
tendency to switch off the mechanical
ventilation because fan noise interfered
with performances. So the theatre
people were very receptive when Alan
Short suggested a non-mechanical airhandling building for their ultimately
successful Lottery bid.
Slow
28
It is a system which deploys the
relatively well understood ‘stack effect’.
Slow-moving air is sucked into the
building at ground level where it is
heated (or not) and is slowly evacuated
at roof level. The principle is simple,
but there are other issues. Short says:
‘If you are forcing air into a building
you can do it through small holes. But
if you are letting it drift in you need big
openings at top and bottom. There is a
big rock venue next door and a
university audiometry department
nearby so there is a special need on this
site to somehow kill the noise from
outside – and stop it escaping. You also
need, with big openings, to devise a
way of keeping the rain out.’
And that is how the idea of the H
pot configuration developed, following
research by engineers Max Fordham
into ways of avoiding downdrafts and
attenuating noise – for which brick is
apparently an ideal material. The
towering height is a consequence of the
need to have the outlet ventilation as
high as possible above the building and
surrounding ridgelines. Short explains,
‘There are tall university building of
The exterior bricks are mellow red soft
mud bricks which, although machinemade, have the irregular, random
appearance of handmade bricks. Short
says that whenever it is possible he
likes to use local sand for mortar. But
it’s impossible to maintain consistency
and colour on a big job. So he
reluctantly used a premixed mortar: ‘a
natural mortar with a bit of colour in it
to make it look more natural,’ he notes
sardonically.
Form follows …
It is a little difficult not to keep your
fingers crossed behind your back when
you nod agreement as the apparently
inevitable logic of the Contact Theatre’s
design unfolds. This is actually a design
of great joy, some inevitable infelicities
of detail design and madness and,
judging by the casual comfortableness
of the users, a design of sound method.
But it would be a pity if anybody came
away with the notion that this building
was the outcome merely of cold
rational reasoning.
RESTORATION
Wash and brush up on JLE
1
Michael Hammett takes a look at the
nineteenth-century brickwork put to new
use at London Bridge Station
Client
London
Transport:
Jubilee Line
Extension
Project
Architects
JLE Architects
and Weston
Williamson
Main Contractor
Costain Taylor
Woodrow JV
Specialist subcontractor
J&W
Renovation Co
Main photography
QA Photos
Brick masonry is one
of civilisation’s most
enduring artefacts.
Robust and durable,
undemanding of
maintenance, it can
often survive its
original purpose by
centuries. When
alterations and
restructuring at
London Bridge Station
were undertaken to
provide access to the
new Jubilee Line
extension of the
London Underground,
extensive brickwork
below the original
station, built in the
1830s, was pressed
into new service
Entrance
photography
Dennis Gilbert
Underground station and between it
and the mainline concourse.
The warehousing was served by
three public roads that run below the
station, linking Tooley Street on the
north side to St Thomas Street on the
south. The most westerly of these,
Joiner Street, has been closed for
incorporation of the space into the new
station. As trafficked and storage areas
they were never required to be
habitable or high-quality spaces and
basic civil engineering construction in
mass brickwork was therefore
considered appropriate. No barrier to
moisture is normally incorporated in
such construction, and there was no
particular concern about staining
caused by the inevitable percolation of
moisture from above.
A new look for the old brickwork
2
L
Michael
Hammett is
Senior Architect
at BDA
1 Precast-concrete ceiling
panels with brick-slip facing
in the new ticket hall of the
Underground station
emulate the vaulting of the
old brickwork
2 Typical state of the
brickwork masonry to be
reused
ondon Bridge has always been a
mainline railway terminal into
which trains run on viaducts
from the counties to the South-east of
the city. To be at the same level as the
trains, the passenger concourse is raised
above the neighbouring streets on a
complex of vaulted spaces. These are of
traditional, heavy, brickwork
construction in semicircular barrel
forms, some of which intersect at right
angles to create large floor areas roofed
by groined vaulting bearing on
freestanding piers.
The bold structural forms of these
spaces, which have been used
predominantly for bonded
warehousing, give them an imposing
appearance. Rather than demolish and
clear away the masonry to make way
for a new installation, the existing
structure was modified to create major
passenger access ways to the new
New access and communication routes
within the station complex and a new
Underground station have required
intricate planning and implementation.
However, it has proved economical and
practical to form new openings in the
existing brickwork, remove walls and
effect alternative support for some of
the vaulting to create attractive and
exciting new facilities while
maintaining support of the existing
mainline station above.
An important part of converting the
old brick structure was extensive
cleaning. During 160 or so years of
service, percolation of moisture from
above has led to leaching of lime and
salts down through the masonry, and
this has produced extensive staining
and encrustation on the surface of the
brickwork. Some surfaces have, from
time to time, been decorated with lime
distemper, but otherwise there has been
little if any maintenance work. The
brickwork in Stainer and Weston
29
3
3
3 The newly cleaned groined vaulting of the
escalator hall below the main line station concourse
4 The new entrance to the underground station –
formerly Joiner Street
4
30
Streets, the roadways under the station
that remain open, still shows the
considerable accumulation of lime
encrustation, leached deposits from the
masonry, hydrocarbon and other
airborne pollutants, dirt and grime that
has built up on the surface.
Two principal methods of cleaning
might be considered appropriate –
chemical cleaning and abrasive blasting.
The latter was chosen because it was
considered that it offers more control.
The pressure of the blasting must be
regulated very carefully to avoid
excessive scouring of the mortar and
damage to the surface of the bricks.
Developments in equipment, abrasives
and blasting techniques have improved
considerably within the last decade.
Harsh blast cleaning that results in the
removal of the surface of bricks along
with stains and blemishes should
rightfully be regarded as crude,
insensitive and inept.
Specialist contractors were invited
to survey the brickwork and tender for
its cleaning, repair and modification.
Part of the negotiations included
execution of trials to demonstrate
proposed techniques and their results.
Requirements of Health and Safety
legislation govern many techniques
used in cleaning masonry. In addition,
at London Bridge the presence of a
tunnelling access point for the Jubilee
Line Extension adjacent to the areas to
be cleaned imposed additional
restrictions – no dust or fumes could be
produced that might be drawn down
into the tunnel. Blasting with waterborne abrasives rather than with dry
ones is generally preferable, because the
latter generates excessive dust – a risk
to health. However, large quantities of
water are used with the former method
and that would also have been
unacceptable. As a compromise,
blasting was done with a minimum-
water slurry of fine olivine abrasive.
This removes dirt, but clings to the
brickwork, necessitating a rinse with
clean water. Clinging slurry also
obscures the work and repeated blasting
is often necessary. All run-off had to be
collected in tanks and removed.
At each end of the escalator hall
(below the mainline station concourse)
new reinforced-concrete beams were
inserted to support sections of the
vaulting. Shoring needles were inserted
through the vaulting just above the new
support level and the brickwork below
removed. Once the new beams were in
place, new sections of brickwork were
inserted to resettle the vaulting on the
new support. For aesthetic reasons, face
brickwork in these areas was rebuilt,
using reclaimed bricks jointed in
natural hydraulic lime mortar to match
the original. Where unaltered, the
cleaned brickwork was carefully
repointed.
The realistic appreciation of the
results of cleaning is very important.
The original brickwork at London
Bridge was never intended to provide
dry interiors and fine finishes and some
dampness and staining as a result of
percolation from above had been
tolerated. It would be unreasonable to
expect cleaning to result in pristine
brickwork that would henceforth
maintain a fine and unblemished
appearance. Happily the supervising
architect understood properly the
rugged, workaday nature of the
structure and his expectation that the
cleaned brickwork should have a
‘romantic’ character has been
interpreted very well indeed.
DESIGN GUIDANCE
Brickwork openings
Malcolm Barnett examines how to use
brickwork dimensions in your favour
1
2
3
4
W
hen dimensioning brickwork,
and positioning and sizing
openings, it is preferable to
use increments based on the length of a
brick, then no cut bricks will be
required and brickwork around openings will be symmetrical and the bond
regular. However, this is not always
possible and these notes deal with
accommodating opening widths that
are not of whole brick increments of
standard metric bricks, particularly
openings for ‘Co-ordinated Size
Components’, a standard range of door
and window units of metric modular
co-ordinated sizes (typically required
for health service buildings designed in
compliance with Health Technical
Memorandum no 55 ).
Figure1: It is often possible to base
overall dimensions on whole brick
increments, but not always to size and
position openings to suit. Half-brick
increments should be the second preference. This will result in either broken
bond (alternate courses of half and two
cut bricks above and below the centre
of the opening) or reverse bond.
Figure 2: With reverse bond the
jambs of an opening are not symmetrical – not generally obvious except
where the jamb bricks are a contrasting
colour.
Figure 3: When openings cannot be
of brick dimensions, for example when
using some ‘Co-ordinated Size
Components’, dimension brickwork
between them using whole brick incre-
ments, accepting that the overall length
of the wall will not be a brick dimension and broken bond will occur at the
centre of the openings.
Figure 4: If there are overriding reasons for making the overall length of
the wall a brick dimension, for example
where a large expanse of multi-storey
brickwork has a few openings at one
level, the openings should be positioned
with their centre lines on brick dimensions. There will be no broken bond
above or below the openings, but cut
bricks will be necessary in the brickwork between some openings
depending on their size and spacing.
Malcolm Barnett is Education Architect
at the BDA. Contact him for details of
CPD and university lecture services
31
Ambion Brick Co Ltd
Swan House, Bosworth Hall, The Park,
Market Bosworth, Warwickshire
CV13 0LJ
Tel 01455 292888
Fax 01455 292877
Email sales@ambion.co.uk
Northern Sales Office
Tel 01388 603008
South East Sales Office
Tel 01403 241555
South West Sales Office
Tel 01752 880659
Baggeridge Brick plc
Fir Street, Sedgley, Dudley,
West Midlands DY3 4AA
Tel 01902 880555
Fax 01902 880432
Sedgley Sales Office
Tel 01902 880666
Kingsbury Sales Office
Tel 01827 260022
Waresley Sales Office
Tel 01299 251300
Hartlebury Sales Office
Tel 01299 250400
Baggeridge Brick Consultancy
Tel 0207 2366222
Rudgwick Sales Office
Tel 01403 822212
Beacon Hill Brick Company Ltd
Wareham Road, Corfe Mullen,
Wimborne, Dorset BH21 3RX
Tel 01202 697633
Fax 01202 605141
Email sales@beaconhill-brick.co.uk
www.beaconhill-brick.co.uk
Blockleys Brick Ltd
Sommerfeld Road, Trench Lock,
Telford, Shropshire TF1 5RY
Tel 01952 251933
Fax 01952 641900
Email tech.info@blockleys.com
www.blockleys.com
Sales Office and Showroom
Tel 01952 251933
Export Sales Office
Tel 01952 251934
Bovingdon Brickworks Ltd
Pudds Cross, Bovingdon,
Near Hemel Hempstead,
Hertfordshire HP3 0NW
Tel 01442 833176
Fax 01442 834539
Email
lescook@bovingdonbrick.sagehost.co.uk
Broadmoor Brickworks Ltd
Whimsey, Cinderford
Gloucester GL14 3JA
Tel 01594 822255
Fax 01594 826782
The Bulmer Brick & Tile Co Ltd
Brickfields, Bulmer, Sudbury, Suf folk
CO10 7EF
Tel 01787 269232
Fax 01787 269040
32
© 2000
The Brick
Development
Association Limited
Woodside House
Winkfield
Windsor
Berks SL4 2DX
Tel 01344 885651
Fax 01344 890129
E-mail
brick@brick.org.uk
Website
www.brick.org.uk
Carlton Brick Ltd
Grimethorpe, Near Barnsley,
South Yorkshire S72 7BG
Tel 01226 711521
Fax 01226 780417
Direct Sales Line
Tel 01226 715000
Charnwood Forest Brick Limited
Old Station Close, Shepshed,
Leicestershire LE12 9NJ
Tel 01509 503203
Fax 01509 507566
Chelwood Brick Limited
Adswood Road, Cheadle Hulme,
Cheadle, Cheshire SK8 5QY
Tel 0161 485 8211
Fax 0161 486 1968
Kingscourt Brick
Kingscourt, County Cavan,
Ireland
Tel +353 (0)42 9667317
Fax +353 (0)42 9667206
Chiddingstone Brickworks Ltd
Bore Place, Chiddingstone,
Edenbridge,
Kent TN8 7AR
Tel 01732 463712
Fax 01732 740264
Marshalls Clay Products Ltd
Head Office
Southowram, Halifax,
West Yorks HX3 9SY
Tel 01422 306000
Fax 0113 220 3555
Sales Office Howley Park
Woodkirk, Dewsbury,
West Yorks WF12 7JJ
Tel 0113 220 3535
Scotland Sales Office
Tel 0141 333 0985
Coleford Brick & Tile Co Ltd
The Royal Forest of Dean Brickworks,
Cinderford, Gloucestershire GL14 3JJ
Tel 01594 822160
Fax 01594 826655
WH Collier Limited
Adswood Road, Cheadle Hulme,
Cheadle, Cheshire SK8 5QY
Tel 0161 485 8211
Fax 0161 486 1968
Dennis Ruabon Limited
Hafod Tileries, Ruabon,
Wrexham LL14 6ET
Tel 01978 843484
Fax 01978 843276
Freshfield Lane Brickworks Limited
Danehill, Haywards Heath,
Sussex RH17 7HH
Tel 01825 790350
Fax 01825 790779
Email sales@flb.uk.com www.flb.uk.com
Hammill Brick Limited
Eastry, Sandwich,
Kent CT13 0EH
Tel 01304 617613
Fax 01304 611036
Hanson Bricks Europe
Stewartby, Bedford MK43 9LZ
London
Tel 08705 258258
Kempston
Tel 08705 258258
Butterley
Tel 08705 258258
Desimpel
Tel 08705 258258
Fax 01234 762041
www.hanson-brickseurope.com
Ibstock Brick Ltd
Ibstock, Leicestershire, LE67 6HS
Tel 01530 261999
Fax 01530 257457
www.ibstock.co.uk
Scotland
Glasgow Tel 0870 9034001
North West
Roughdales Tel 0870 9034002
Parkhouse Tel 0870 9034007
North East
Nostell Tel 0870 9034003
Throckley Tel 0870 9034004
Eastern
Leicester Tel 0870 9034008
Dorket Head Tel 0870 9034009
Hathernware Tel 0870 9034016
West Midlands
Lodge Lane Tel 0870 9034006
South West
Cattybrook Tel 0870 9034010
Pinhoe Tel 0870 9034011
South East
Laybrook Tel 0870 9034012
London
London Tel 0870 9034013
Normanton Brick Co Ltd
Wakefield Road Brickworks,
Normanton,
West Yorkshire WF6 1BG
Tel 01924 892142
Fax 01924 223455
Northcot Brick Limited
Blockley, Near Moreton-in-Marsh,
Gloucestershire GL56 9LH
Tel 01386 700551
Fax 01386 700852
Ormonde Brick Ltd
Castlecomber, County Kilkenny,
Ireland
Tel +353 (0)56 41323
Fax +353 (0)56 41314
Phoenix Brick Company Ltd
The Brickworks, Campbell Drive,
Barrow Hill,
Chesterfield S43 3PR
Tel 01246 473171
Fax 01246 280345
Red Bank Manufacturing Co Ltd
Measham, Swadlincote
Derbyshire DE12 7EL
Tel 01530 270333
Fax 01530 273667
Email
redbank-manufacturing@dial.pipex.com
Redland Tile & Brick
Sales and admin
61 Largy Road, Crumlin,
Co Antrim BT29 4RR
Tel 02894 422791
Fax 02894 422165
www.redland-tile-brick.co.uk
Sussex Hand Made Brick Ltd
Fourteen Acre Lane
Three Oaks
Hastings
East Sussex TN35 4NB
Tel 01424 814344
Fax 01424 814707
The Wemyss Brick Co Ltd
45-49 Cowley Street, Methil,
Fife KY8 3QQ
Tel 01592 712313
Fax 01592 716349
Email wemyssbrickco@btinternet.com
www.wemyssbrick.co.uk
The York Handmade Brick Co Ltd
Forest Lane, Alne,
York YO61 1TU
Tel 01347 838881
Fax 01347 838885
Email sales@yorkhandmade.co.uk
The contents of this publication are intended for general guidance only and any person intending to use these contents for the purpose of design, construction or repair of brickwork or any
related project should first consult a professional advisor. The Brick Development Association, its servants, and any persons who contributed to or who are in any way connected with this
publication accept no liability arising from negligence or otherwise howsoever caused for any injury or damage to any person or property or as a result of any use or reliance on any method,
product, instruction, idea, or other contents of this publication.