Agriculture Reference
In-Depth Information
and they were full of good drawings of details and the orders and contained accu-
rate plates of doors, windows and other elements. Sold to both the gentry and
craftsmen, they spread the word of self-improvement….
The proliferation of pattern topics reached its height in the years between
1725 and 1760, after which it diminished (Summerson, 1947, 58):
…with the expansion of the architectural profession and the coincident repres-
sion of the craftsman's initiative. In the latter part of the century we get a very
different wave of book-publishing, sponsored not by craftsmen but by architects,
and designed not to instruct the workman, but to charm the potential client.
Yet, and with particular regard to the majority of brick-built Georgian London,
Cruickshank and Wyld (1975, 1) emphasise the elegance:
…was formed not by great architects but by master builders, entrepreneurs
and all kinds of speculators. Yet the coherence it had, both in construction and
design, belies this curiously multiple parentage and reveals that a great binding
force was at work: the orderly flexibility of 18th century architectural classicism.
Brickmaking
Brick manufacture in London was still controlled by the Tylers and Bricklayer's
Company; though their powers were receding, necessitated by the demands to
quickly re-build after the Great Fire of 1666.
Brickmakers no longer used only the overlying clay or Pliocene layer, but
older geological clays such as Eocene. Though some bricks from this period
have 'Spanish' (ground sea-coal ash finely sieved with clay giving an integral
fuel) within their body, which was a unique feature of the 'London Stock' brick-
making process, it was preferable and more common to use unadulterated clean
brickearth or clay for rubbers or cutters. Creating an internal fireball within a
rubber meant it was likely to burn harder internally, or leave particles of clinker
within its body, impeding cutting and rubbing to shape.
Bricks continued to be made by either slop or pallet moulding. A major
problem for all brickmakers was ensuring that the thrown clay filled all the
corners of the mould. The answer was found in a clever development on the
stock board in pallet moulding, the exact date of its introduction is not known,
but as Hammond (1981, 11) states:
From the late eighteenth century a raised block or kick was fixed to the stock to
form the frog or recess in the bottom of each brick.
The kick, which changed in size and shape with the passage of time, had the
effect of forcing, or 'kicking', the thrown clot of clay outwards, tight into the
