Clayscapes: Extracted Landscapes and Circular Futures of the Brick Industry

Abstract

Brick has been a staple of the built environment for over 10,000 years, first appearing alongside our earliest civilizations. The worldwide abundance of clay paired with brick’s many positive performance attributes has maintained its relevance across centuries. But the industry has recently declined in the US as it has faced competition from more affordable building materials, strayed further from its inherent strengths, and received scrutiny regarding its sustainable attributes. However, as the discussion around sustainable design has evolved, the properties of this ancient material have shown the potential to be directly aligned with contemporary circular economy and life cycle design principles. This thesis explores targeted alterations within the full life cycle of brick that would allow the material to achieve its full potential as a durable and adaptable building component that responds to present day environmental challenges. These objectives can be achieved by preserving the embedded energy in historic buildings, restoring abandoned clay mine sites, replacing raw clay with unfired construction waste during brick production, and utilizing alternatives to cement mortar that encourage disassembly. Considerable existing research has successfully developed interventions within each of these themes, but this thesis finds exponential improvement by looking at how these subjects can build upon each other when reviewed in the full life cycle of brick. The research is framed in the context of Seattle, which has a unique history with the material that is reflected in the impacts of mining on the landscape and the city’s stock of historic masonry buildings that are at risk of demolition.