|
|
|
 |
|
 |
|
|
Page 1
|
|
|
| This article by Mark Mendel, owner of Monterey Masonry, appears in the May 2005 edition of Structure magazine. Reprinted with permission |
 |
Restored 18th century fireplace and bake oven. Marble cheeks, brick, granite hearthstones.
Photo courtesy of Paul Rocheleau |
|
|
|
|
Historic Masonry Restoration
There was a building boom here in Berkshire County, Massachusetts, during the 1780s and 1790s. Many hundreds of houses survive.
They are timber framed, wide plank sheathed, and clapboarded with the cedar, pine, and chestnut that was plentiful in the area.
These spare, elegant, farmhouses were built without engineers, architects, or building codes, yet here they are after 225 years, their fireplaces brightly burning, warming a 9th generation of New Englanders.
This amazing architectural accumulation makes up the core fabric that we recognize as New England.
Because these houses are still lived in, because they are not historical theme parks, they serve to bind the past and the present together as a single living thing. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
 |
| 18th century fireplace and bake oven before and during restoration. |
|
|
As builders and design professionals we are charged with the protection of this legacy. Our challenge is to make these houses last another 225 years, while at the same time bringing them into the 21st century.
We must introduce modern systems of energy and information, as well as contemporary codes for fire, safety, and energy effi ciency… all the while maintaining the historical integrity of these architectural treasures. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
| 18th century fireplace and bake oven before and during restoration. |
|
|
|
|
Restoration must begin with an understanding of the technology and materials that were common to the period. These techniques, tools, and materials were the result of hundreds if not thousands of years of development by trial and error.
These houses were hardly “primitive” in the sense of crude. As the poet Gary Snyder has written, “What we call the primitive is a mature system with deep capacities for stability and protection built into it.”
Structures were “field tested” over long years of close observation. Results were rarely written down and even more rarely disseminated to newer builders.
There exists no owner’s manual for the 18th century house. Instead, knowledge was passed down over generations from craftsman to craftsman within a master/ apprentice tradition.
Structures that evolved through this slow and cautious process were uniquely, even brilliantly, suited to long-term survival. There is a system at work here, an integrated, holistic system.
Understanding this system is the key to both the restoration and preservation process. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Changes made without understanding can cause the system to break down.
Look for example at lime plaster laid across wooden lathes. The wet plaster keys, or wraps around each piece of lathe and “grabs a hold of it.”
This simple mechanism has supported enormous plaster ceiling loads for hundreds of years without failure.
Now introduce insulation. The insulation is put in tightly in a way that presses against the back of the lathes. When the mason pushes the plaster with his trowel, the insulation pushes back. So there is no keying and the ceiling falls down.
Good system, just not understood. If the insulation was stuffed in AFTER the plasterwork there would be no problem. Breakdowns occur in three areas:
1. Neglect of maintenance. Roofs and gutters that fail are, notoriously, the point of the wedge of structural breakdown. Good maintenance nourishes survival.
2. Changes external to the system, changes that could not have been anticipated by the builders. 18th Century builders of brick town houses did not dream of pile drivers working nearby, or of subway trains constantly shaking the ground beneath their footings.
3. And finally, problems occur when the restoration efforts are outside the system of the architecture. If the engineer says, “It’s too old, it can’t be saved, tear it down,” if the builder says “Throw out those old doors and get new ones,” the legacy is in jeopardy. It’s time for a more sympathetic team.
We are all familiar with concept of “load bearing”. May I suggest a new concept: Historic load bearing. Incorrect materials and techniques introduced into historic architecture fail. They fail to carry the historic load and we have an aesthetic collapse. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Next  |
|
|
 |
|
 |
|
