Blind Side Facing Walls: Advanced Techniques for Hidden Façade Restoration
This past week, we took a look at a brick facade wall which had been originally built against the building that was standing prior to the construction of the remaining building. That prior building was now gone and the original wall was exposed. That particular original wall was not in bad shape, but today we’re going to look at another building where the original remaining wall is in very bad shape.
The wall we looked at last week had voids and omissions and plants growing right out of the brick. It needed restoration and repair. That wall however was the responsibility of the owner of the remaining building. In this case though, we’re looking at another wall at a different building and the aesthetic concerns of the remaining wall are basically irrelevant to the resprctive building owners. Instead the property owners at the opposite side of the property line now have to look at the sloppily built original wall.
This wall could probably also benefit from repointing because the age of the remaining building is significantly older than a typical repointing life cycle. Here you can see that the bricks are set at different depths from adjacent horizontal plane and mortar has been slopped onto the sides and in some cases oozed out from the bed and perpend mortar joints in goops and globules. It’s clear, none of these mortar joints have ever been struck or tooled. Striking a motor joint, as we explained last week essentially smooths out the face surface of the mortar joint which also helps repair a better weather resistant and continuous finish.
The mortar that remains at the face of this wall, in this extreme example, is not consistent or even similar from any one area to the next. In the center of the picture below large chunks of mortar have been smeared onto the faces of the brick. At the bottom left corner of the photograph, there are voids and ommissions between the bricks and at the top left corner of the picture, mortar has oozed out but just barely from the surface, not nearly as excessive as in the center of the photograph.
If you look closely at the next picture below, and the bottom left-hand corner, you can see that they have kind of thrown together a hodgepodge of materials to build this wall, or wt least fill in openings. The majority of the wall is built with a historic solid brick, but a standardized clay tile masonry unit has been used in a cluster in that bottom corner. This type of material is similar to a CMU cinder block, instead of being based in concrete cement though, it’s actually a type of hollow kiln fire clay.
The four-sided envelope of the tile block is run horizontally so the strength access is perpendicular to a typical cinder block. It lacks the structural support found in a cinder block but is also much later weight and used for different, lighter purposes.
The next picture below shows an angle looking up the side of the wall, and you can see it’s a very tall building that now has exposed bare side all the way from the ground to the top. However, unlike other buildings of similar construction this building was never intended to be exposed and visible at this side.
If an exterior wall like this was to become exposed or identified at a building, there are several options to address the condition. From a purely functional perspective it’s obvious that spot repoining can be done and would help the overall condition, but application of a parge coat or stucco could also smooth the entire area and help even more in a visual type of way. (That type of application will be particularly complicated with this rough surface though.)
This upcoming next week, we’re going to look at an alternative type of system that actually was installed at the adjacent part of this wall and show how a little bit of creative thinking can possibly save costs a little bit and provide a new and unique aesthetic.
We can Help
Our company focuses on historic restoration more than modern building upkeep, maintenance, and construction, but our company understands both types of construction very well and a full picture well-rounded approach is needed in any niche in the construction industry. Although we focus on historic restoration, repointing, tuckpointing and historic brick repair, our company also has technical knowledge and competencies in the areas of modern and contemporary construction as well as we become one of the leaders in that area of the market today. Understanding both historic and modern or contemporary construction is useful because both aspects help understand the challenges and potential solutions for challenges in building science and construction.
We can help with a variety of historic masonry restoration needs and upkeep, from modest tuckpointing and or repointing to complicated and extensive historic masonry restoration. Infinity Design Solutions is a historic restoration specialist contractor specializing in both historic masonry restoration such as tuckpointing our repointing, and brick repair. If you have questions about the architectural details or facade of your historic building in Washington DC, reach out and say hello and if we can help we’ll be glad to assist you. You can email us or call us on the telephone at the following link: contact us here.
