The storefront in 2021, dark red brown brick running above a long band of shop window to a rounded brick corner
Case File 350

Darkening Off Color Radial Shapes on a Retail Building

The rounded corner shapes on this West Virginia retail building went up off color against the field brick. The brick manufacturer paid to have them corrected rather than replaced. The corner was photographed again in 2019 and again in 2021, thirteen years on.

Case No. 350
Structure Retail store
Location West Virginia
Stained April 2008
Re-photographed 2019 and 2021
Elapsed 13 years, Silver level

2008

  1. Close on the rounded brick corner in 2008, its units blotched paler and pinker in places against the darker brick around them, with a camera date burned into the bottom corner Before, 2008 View this photo larger
  2. The same rounded brick corner in 2008 after the work, the units carried to one even red brown under the soffit, the burned-in camera date reading 04/30/200 After, 2008 View this photo larger
  3. The building corner in 2008, the sign wall and the rounded corner reading grey purple beside the red brown field brick and its two buff bands on the return wall Before, 2008 View this photo larger
  4. The same corner in 2008 after the work, the sign wall on the left turning through the rounded units into the red brown field brick and its buff band After, 2008 View this photo larger

What was wrong

The radial shapes, the rounded units that turn the corner, went up off color against the field brick around them. Nothing had failed. A special shape comes from a different mould and often a different firing, so it can land outside the range of the wall it belongs to. The brick manufacturer hired the correction.

What was done

The shapes were darkened for a better match. The file is blunt about the constraint: a very hard fired brick with very low absorption, which rules out any major color change. Closing a few shades across one corner was the whole job. Both 2008 close frames carry the same burned-in camera date, 30 April.

2019 and 2021, thirteen years on

  1. The whole storefront in 2021, dark red brown brick above a long band of shop window, a rounded brick corner at the right and marked accessible bays across the parking lot in front 2021 View this photo larger
  2. The wall from a sharp angle in 2019, courses of red brown brick and a buff band running along to the rounded corner and the return wall beyond it After, 2019 View this photo larger
  3. The rounded corner in 2021, its units reading the same red brown as the field brick and buff band on the return wall beside it 13 Years After View this photo larger

What thirteen years prove

Same corner, same shapes, still reading in range with the field brick beside them. On the certification scale that is Silver, which covers ten years and over. As of 2026 the work is eighteen years old, and the 2021 frames are 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 350, transcribed beside it so it can be read on a phone and by a search engine.

The case study form for case 350, filled in and signed by the authorizer View the signed form full size
Project name
Business, WV (2008)
Level
Silver. The scale runs Bronze at seven and over, Silver at ten and over, Gold at fifteen and over, Platinum at twenty and over.
Hired by
The brick manufacturer
Reason for project
Complaint or problem
Issue
"The radial (rounded corner) shapes were off-colored."
What was corrected
"We darkened the shapes for a better match."
Storyline
"This was a very hard fired brick with very low absorption. With these kinds of brick, as long as it isn't a major color change, a Proven Masonry Stain was and is the right choice!"
Authorized
Donald A. Foster, signed, dated 2020
Address
Withheld on the form, which records "release permission required".
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