Mixing mud and laying brick!

This reason I chose Colorado Mountain College for my Historic Preservation degree was because it's one of very few colleges that offer a trade based program. Needless to say, the hands-on classes are by far my favorite. So last week when we got to lay some brick in my Masonry class, I was really excited!

Our class is at Hayden Ranch- our colleges very own historic laboratory. One of the old bunk houses desperately needed some attention to its chimney. Here it was before:


The existing mortar on the 15 courses you see here was incredibly fragile. We could literally pick up the bricks with our hands and remove them from the course below. The original chimney had 22 courses- so we intended to restore it to the original. (I wish I could say the age of this particular building but I really don't know.)

There are so many things to consider when restoring brick. It's very important to match the color of the mortar, the color of the brick, the strength and make-up of the mortar and brick as well. It might seem pretty simply, but that's a lot to get right. You have to consider the mixture of the mortar- what's the recipe? Is it one part lime, one part portland cement, six parts sand? There are actually many different recipes for different needs. Different masons have different opinions as to the best recipe. Some masons truly believe in using hydraulic lime only. So many options....to see more about mortars click here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lime_mortar

The first thing we needed to do for this chimney was make up some sample mixes or mortar to see if we could at least match the color. This bunk house has not been occupied for a long time, and there are no plans to change that, so this chimney will not be functioning. The main purpose of the restoration is for aesthetics and basic structural integrity. Fortunately for us that meant we didn't have to get things absolutely perfect, just pretty close. So we mixed up a few batches until we got a close match:



After letting each batch dry, we had a better idea of what the color was. After coming up with a pretty close mix, we were ready to lay some brick!


This was the exciting part. I love getting my hands dirty and actually making something. You know, something you can actually touch and feel and see. I also love being on roofs. I'm not sure why exactly, but I've always loved it. Maybe it's because you're not supposed to be on a roof, it feels a bit mischievous. Maybe its because you gain a new perspective, everything looks smaller from up high, and your worries do too. Maybe it's just because the view is so awesome!



Whatever the reason, it was great to be up there and learn some masonry skills. Our teacher, Terry Alexander has been a mason for practically his whole life (learning the trade from his father.) He's a great mason and a good person to show you the basics. On the homepage of his website you can see a really beautiful sculpture that his father made. Who would of thought of a brick sculpture!? You can visit his website here: http://gostonecraft.com/index.php

We only had about 7 courses of brick to lay, but it took much longer than I would have thought. Fortunately we had most of the original brick from the chimney, but not quite all of it. Well, I think we did have all of it but a lot of it crumbled and was unusable. So, we did our best to find a color that was close and would blend in well. That was not an easy task. You'll be able to see from the picture below which bricks were not original. The good thing about that however, is that time will lay a nice patina on these bricks, and eventually they'll fade right in.



I think the finished product looks pretty dang good for our first try. And remember, time will be to our advantage with the aesthetics. I think I really like masonry. No sharp chisels, no splinters or hammered thumbs, no table saw kick-backs. It so much more peaceful than working with wood!