REBUILDING AN 18TH CENTURY WALL
August 2, 2023
Rapid Response are well versed at handling the unusual project, and this carefully crafted 18th Century Flemish Bond wall was no exception.
The wall had been standing proud as part of the gated entrance to a beautiful country house for the past few centuries until its unfortunate demise following a collision with what can only be determined as a large commercial vehicle – it really would take something of that size to knock down a wall of this stature.
The insurance company’s brief was to restore the wall to its former glory looking exactly alike the original, but build in the same style. Normally a large entrance wall and primarily the pillar would be of hollow construction, but this wall had been carefully constructed as a solid piece. Not only solid, it used a combination of three brick carefully cut brick sizes as part of the construction, and made more difficult by the nature of join between the pillar and the wall itself. Normally a straight run from the pillar then forms a curve to give a straight wall to the boundary of the property, but in this instance the join was angled. This meant that not only did we have to allow with each layer of the wall being different in regards to cutting the bricks within the pillar to allow for the angle, but we also had to do the very same with the wall itself.
First came the dismantling of the broken wall, which included the lifting of a very large cast iron decorate ball, which again had probably been sitting there on its hand made slab for the past few centuries.
Following dismantling our craftsmen set about building the wall, but first we had to match the 200 year-old bricks, which was no mean feat. Following scrutinisation of 10 types of brick, the owner chose the best match which was incredibly close to the original. We then set about the long task of rebuilding tis beautiful wall, and restoring it back to its former glory, which included matching the existing slab for the cast iron ball to be put back into position.
It’s not very often you get to see 200 year old walls in such close proximity, and admire the construction, albeit if it was extremely labour intensive to restore to exacting specifications.
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