Photo from the Greene and Greene “Gamble House” in Pasadena, CA. Circa about 1910, I think.
What technique is used to get the bricks laid up in the overhead flareouts? Temporary centering, as was used in gothic cathedral roofs?
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Cool fireplace. There is no substitute for craftsmanship...
My guess is that they built a wood support to lay them on - similar to doing arch - and once set up a bit, they removed it and struck the joints.
There was an article in FHB #50, Jan. '89, about building arched brick roofs without centering. The title was "Laying Up Brick Bovedas". IIRC, the main thing was to avoid going too fast. With appropriately sticky mortar, you can get one brick or one course of bricks to stick at a pretty high tilt.
How beautiful is that?! Love the Craftsman style, it's my favorite. The rays of sun really make the picture. Nice.
Gene If I had to do something like that today , I would build a centered arch support to nest in between the wooden beams like they did and lay the arches from the back side continuing to lay up the fireplace as I went, I wonder if the resulting cantlever is used to support an upstairs hearth for another fireplace? probley so --masons laying refractory brick in hightemp ductwork or forming for poured in place refractory for cement kilns do a lot of interesting work like that --least thats what we use to do at the cement plant I use to work at.
Boy , if it hadn't been for that lucky transverse beam, that whole thing would've just continued to fall!
Think the mason noticed it was falling / curving toward him?
Forrest - seeing to the heart of things