The geological composition of Lake Michigan's clay and the way it is fired make the Chicago Common brick different from the typical red bricks used in construction in the US. Due to its irregularities and imperfections, it is generally used for parts of buildings that are not completely visible, such as side and rear walls, exaust pipes or structural support of facades.
In the Thayer Brick House by Los Angeles-based architectural firm Brooks+Scarpa, the Common brick becomes a structural device and a compositional element of the street facade. Vertical columns of twisted bricks create a filter between the outside and the inside, a large screen which can both appear open and welcoming or closed and impenetrable, depending on the onlooker’s point of view. Daylight filtered through the brick penetrates the house creating changing geometries of light and shadow on the walls and floors of the rooms and surrounding buildings, while at night the glow of the lights lit inside the house design a constantly changing pattern on the brick wall.
Through a process of technical research Brooks + Scarpa proposes an innovative application of the local brick that becomes perceptually old and new for the collettive imagination and at the same time acquires new meaning.
Twisted brick columns protect a courtyard house in Chicago
Brooks + Scarpa used the less popular Chicago Common brick as the protagonist of their newest building: a single family house with a clay screen on the front facade.
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