Hand Crafted Bricks and today

Many , many years ago houses were made of whatever could be found, even if it meant just sleeping in or under a tree and sometime even in a cave and was mostly did this as a precaution for protection for mankind from the forces of nature and predators.

Later we found some geniuses start discovering ways to clothe themselves, built weapons and tools and started making fires and this fire story whether by accident or great decision used in combination with clay, mud and straw became our first hand crafted bricks.

So the industrial age of home building took off. The more affluent you were, the more affluent was your home, even if you didn’t need it, just like today, I guess.

At first these “brickmakers” later know as masonaries made these bricks by molding water, clay, mud and straw next to a river bed and wild carry it in baskets woven by straw to a huge open area where there would be a maximum amount of sun available (very famous in Egypt and such desert areas where temperatures reached such high temperature you could cure a brick overnight.

So with these baskets loaded to the brim and them laboring under the weight back to their” drying area” they would unload and go back for more.

They would have laborers mostly sons and wives who wild be sitting on the haunches and molding these bricks onto shapes and laid nicely on loose dust filled areas to prevent sticking and would dry overnight, as per the high temperatures.

Later on the bricks would be sold to the builders who would actually give them a pittance for the work and charge the want to be home owners and arm and a leg to buy these houses they bought, therefore more of the brick maker sons started investing in the art of building as well but this not only caused violent competition and sometimes deadly.

So from that humble beginning of hand crafted bricks by hand next to a river we now have factories making not only bricks but building blocks, dykes and all other sorts of concrete structures used to building with metal inside to strengthen and keep it flexible, but we still have these old traditions of hand making bricks being practiced in the old world like Vietnam, Singapore and Malaysia where they are so good they not only build houses but miniature palaces and paradises for themselves and families.