September 13, 2021

Masonary Parapet Wall

A previous post showed assembly of the large room roof and the surrounding parapet walls.  However, the west side parapet wall of the roof initially was not addressed.   This is because a concrete 'buttress' was poured to protect the large room from water coming off the dome and thus it made sense to add masonry on top of the buttress. [For better understanding of why a 'buttress was needed, see blog post here:  https://cobstudio.blogspot.com/2020/07/spillway-for-water-off-dome.html ]

Therefore an opportunity arose where I could assemble a decorative masonry wall on top of the concrete buttress to add some architectural styling to the overall structure.  At my 'resource area', I located every brick and decorative block I could find to complete this section of the roof structure.

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The photograph above shows the South end of the masonry parapet wall where it terminates and integrates with the 'cob' parapet wall (southwest corner of the large room roof).

The photograph below was taken at roof level facing west showing the full length of the masonry parapet wall.

Notice that the decorative block wall is not uniform with regards to the type of block resulting in a lack of visual symmetry.  I'm good with that. There is satisfaction with the fact that I am using leftover building materials previously purchased for other projects.  

Also, notice the pattern of brick on top of the ornamental block. I had two type bricks, one a regular sized brick and the other a thin brick.  I didn't have enough of either brick to lay on top all the way across, so by alternating the brick types I was able to complete the topping and create a pattern.

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