A Ton of Bricks

Not a ton, really, but a lot.

We are finally working on the brick wall project. We had planned on buying brick veneer, which is a thin slice of brick that you can tile with. Z Brick is sold at Menards and is created to look like real brick, but honestly, I don't like the look of it. And we wanted the look of an old brick wall.

We found a company that sells thin brick in Chicago and had considered driving there to pick it up. But it was, all together, like $700-800. A little pricy for a decorative addition to the house.

We had even looked at making bricks. Thave used-brick molds that you mix concrete, color it and pour. You have to play with the color to achieve the different variations, and paint some of the interior of the molds to get the different whites and black hues. Translation = a TON of work, pun intended.

Frustrated, the fireman had went to visit another brick store and found these real bricks.

This is the color we liked the best. They are rough and used brick. Beautiful!

The only problem is that these are real bricks. They are thick, not thin. So, hubby bought one and took it home and got out his tile saw.

And sliced the front 1/2 inch off each side.

That orange/red dust on the ground is from the bricks. The tile saw uses water to cool the bricks or tile so that they don't crack.

So, we went back to the store, to decide which color and texture we liked the best and bought these. About 500 bricks.

Then he used his saw and did this.

Well, he only did like 30 of them. It's a work in progress.

It will take some time, but that's ok. We he will work on it between us redoing the bathroom.

I don't trust myself with that saw.

That's my story and I'm stickin to it.

This is the living room. We have OSB plywood on it for the tiling of the thin bricks. The wall to the left, is the pretty, dark green that we recently painted, with a large 3 piece picture window in the center.

The room isn't really as dark as it looks in this picture. We light those lamps and get a nice glow 'low light' in the room or turn on the lights in the big fans and the rooms lights up brightly.

The beam you see at the right is the one that we recently put up. It's the end of the beam support.

The brick wall will run right into it, so it looks like the beam is part of the brick wall.

This is the back side of the brick wall. It will be bricked as well. Otherwise, it would lose the illusion of a true old brick wall. The room to the right is our bedroom.

The best part of this?

Each brick was $.42, and since we got to use both sides of the brick, we will be able to get 1000 thin bricks out of this. And the cost was only $210.