The dealership wall in 2019, its brick an even tan and brown range between dark window frames
Case File 233

Matching an Addition on an Illinois Car Dealership

The brick on an addition to this dealership did not match the range already standing. The mason who built it hired the staining in 2008, and the file is candid that the budget covered the brick and not the mortar. It was photographed again eleven years later and certified then.

Case No. 233
Structure Car dealership
Location Illinois
Stained 2008
Re-photographed 2019
Elapsed 11 years, Silver level

2008

  1. A raking view along the dealership wall before the work, the brick piers a warm tan and the wall panel beyond them a cooler grey brown Before, 2008 View this photo larger
  2. An outside corner of the dealership after the 2008 work, the brick on both faces reading as one tan and brown range with darker accent units scattered through it After, 2008 View this photo larger

What was wrong

Nothing had failed. An addition went up beside the existing building and its brick did not agree with what was already standing. The file records the ask in the customer's own terms: the color of the brick to match the rest of the range. The mason who built it hired the work, and the reason on the file is an addition or makeover rather than a complaint.

What was done

Mineral stain, brushed in by hand. The file is exact about the extent: one hundred percent of the off-colored brick was stained. It is equally exact about the limit. The customer had not budgeted for staining and paid for the brick only, and the file records what that costs: mortar is only twenty percent of the wall but plays a one hundred percent effect on the brick color.

2019, eleven years on

  1. A brick elevation of the dealership in 2019, three windows set between brick piers, the wall reading as one tan and brown range from the sills down to the gravel bed 11 Years After View this photo larger

What eleven years prove

Eleven years on, the addition and the building it was added to read as one wall. On the certification scale that is Silver, which covers ten years and over. As of 2026 the work is eighteen years old, and the 2019 certification is the most recent record on it.

The signed file

Every certified job gets the same form, signed on the day someone goes back to the building. This is the one for case 233, transcribed beside the scan so it can be read on a phone and by a search engine.

Scan of the case study form for case 233, filled in and signed View the signed form full size
Project name
Car Dealership IL (2008)
Level
Silver. The scale runs Bronze at seven to nine years, Silver at ten and over, Gold at fifteen and over, Platinum at twenty and over.
Hired by
The mason or contractor
Reason for project
Addition or makeover
Issue
"The customer wanted the color of the brick to match the rest of the range."
What was corrected
"We stained 100% of the off-colored brick."
Storyline
"The customer did not plan on having to budget for staining so only hired us to stain the brick when the mortar also needed to be stained. Mortar is only 20% of the wall but plays a 100% effect on the brick color. To get the closest match we could we would have to stain the mortar."
Authorized
Donald A. Foster, signed, dated 2019
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Every job we stain enters the same discipline: photographed, revisited, re-photographed.

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