Short, but nice article on double brick housing in WA. It’ll be interesting to see how the home construction industry here changes in the coming decades.
Kinda reminds me of rammed earth, but I think rammed earth is better about cooling down. (?)
The rammed earth i’ve seen has been thicker than two bricks, and had no cavity. Maybe the properties are similar, but magnified?
Maybe. I haven’t heard of rammed earth keeping a house hot. I’m guessing that’s the cavity in the middle holding hot air.
It’s mass that holds heat. Rammed earth is great if you don’t let it get too hot (so needs shading), or if it’s insulated (the best way).
For almost all of Australia bar the tropical north, the best construction is insulated mass - ie cladding (lightweight or not), then a cavity, then loads of insulation and a Vapor membrane, then masonry.
And my house currently has one of the four layers you suggest. I might just have to save your comment, i’d definitely missed the vapor layer and a cavity behind the cladding.
Na, nor have I.
I think in the future there will be a market for putting insulation plus cladding on the outside of double brick homes. Mine turns in to a pizza oven after a few consecutive 35+ days.
This is what we’re starting to think about doing at mine. At the moment thinking some kind of faux limestone cladding/half brick outer shell. Not only to hide some extra insulation, but to hide the boring cream bricks. But in the early planning days still.
Same in QLD. My friends were complaining about their double brick, and how it holds heat for days and days, making it unbearable.
Are the old Queenslanders style house still built much?
They are yes. There’s a current trend where new builds are emulating the older look with weatherboard appearance. But, it’s all modern materials now, and inside they’re nothing like the beautiful old girls of the past. Much more liveable though, with all the mod cons.
I just went down a rabbit hole looking at modern Queenslanders, i see what you mean all the internal fret work is gone, just regular houses on the inside, apart from the good views.
But look at this one, i can’t even believe they’re calling it a Queenslander! Super modern!
Wow, that’s indeed a modern take. I can just imagine my car starting up under the house, vibrations rumbling through it, and waking everybody up.
why do they use these decorative bricks for building walls? why not normal modern bricks? you know, these: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/ec/Porotherm_style_clay_block_brick_angle_1.jpg
What a lovely utilitarian idea! Seriously though, i reckon theres someone out there who has used these bricks in a ridiculously cool way. I’ll have to wait for the Grand designs episode i suppose. /j
pretty much all of hungary (not sure about other countries, but i’d expect at least the rest of central europe too) uses these types of bricks for almost everything. it’s not a new thing either, we’ve had these all my life. not sure when they were introduced.
but i’ve never seen these types used by anglo nations, and it’s always bugged me.
Of course! I’m thinking too locally, i’ve even seen people building with these types of bricks in Europe!
Yeah, i’m not 100% sure. But the brick look, with good tuck-pointing has been a popular style, see below for a cool example. Maybe it’s something to do with rendering not being available or popular in anglo countries.
ah yeah, you cant leave these thermo bricks exposed, they look absolutely dogshit. especially as they make you immediately think “unfinished house, oh no”. it’s like seeing exposed house wrapping or OSB…
as for rendering not being popular, that’s the other thing. why isnt it? decorative bricks and no rendering, my two biggest questions about the “anglo” building industry.
I had to look up what OSB is ( Oriented Strand Board). We don’t get much of anybof that stuff here. I’d say its because the weather has rarely required a fully encased house.
Rendering is way more popular in Perth in the last 20 odd years than in other times. I think if you had double brick it was a status symbol so you want to show the nice uniform bricks off. Maybe it’s something about a brick houses perceived permanence? But i don’t really know.
