Quality You Can Trust: How We Clean, Check and Prepare Our Reclaimed Bricks
Reclaimed bricks are becoming an increasingly popular choice for building, renovation, restoration, landscaping and new construction projects. Their aged appearance, natural colour variations and individual character can add something to a project that simply isn't possible to achieve with many modern bricks.
However, when buying reclaimed bricks, quality is just as important as appearance.
Reclaimed bricks have already had a previous life. They may have spent decades forming part of a house, wall, factory, mill, terrace or other structure before being carefully removed and given the opportunity to be used again. Because of this, every reclaimed brick is slightly different, and not every brick that is recovered will necessarily be suitable for resale.
That's why we take the preparation and quality of our reclaimed bricks seriously.
At Cheaper Building Materials, we have developed a three-step cleaning and quality-control process to help ensure that the bricks we supply are properly prepared, carefully inspected and suitable for our customers' requirements.
We don't simply reclaim bricks and send them straight out. Every brick goes through a process before it reaches you.
Why Quality Matters When Buying Reclaimed Bricks
One of the biggest attractions of reclaimed bricks is their individuality.
Unlike newly manufactured bricks, reclaimed bricks can have natural variations in colour, texture, weathering and surface markings. These differences are often exactly what customers are looking for when trying to achieve an authentic reclaimed or traditional appearance.
However, there is an important difference between natural character and excessive damage.
A reclaimed brick can have signs of its previous life while still being a good-quality, usable brick. On the other hand, bricks with significant damage, missing faces or unsuitable edges may not be appropriate for the selection being supplied.
This is why inspection is such an important part of our process.
Our aim isn't to make reclaimed bricks look brand new. The character is part of the reason you're buying reclaimed bricks in the first place. Instead, our aim is to remove unwanted old mortar, identify damaged bricks and select bricks that meet our standards while retaining the authentic appearance that makes reclaimed materials so desirable.
Step 1: Thoroughly Cleaned by Hand
The first stage begins with the removal of old mortar and other material left behind from the brick's previous use.
When bricks are reclaimed from an existing structure, they can have hardened mortar attached to their surfaces. Depending on how the bricks were originally laid and removed, some may have more mortar remaining than others.
Removing this material is not simply about making the brick look cleaner. Proper preparation allows us to see the actual condition of the brick underneath the old mortar, which is important when carrying out our quality inspection.
A Hands-On Cleaning Process
Our workers carefully remove old mortar by hand using a chisel hammer.
This is a process that requires care and attention. The objective is to remove unwanted material without unnecessarily damaging the original brick.
Each brick has its own characteristics, so the cleaning process isn't simply a case of treating every brick identically. Our team works through the material carefully, removing old mortar while allowing the original character of the reclaimed brick to remain visible.
This hands-on approach is an important part of preparing reclaimed bricks for their next use.
Preserving Character While Removing Unwanted Material
One of the advantages of reclaimed bricks is that they don't all look identical.
You can see variations in colour, texture, weathering and surface appearance, depending on the brick's age and where it originally came from.
We don't believe these characteristics should simply be removed.
Instead, our cleaning process is about finding the balance between proper preparation and preserving character. The result is a reclaimed brick that has been cleaned and prepared while still retaining the distinctive appearance customers look for.
Step 2: Every Brick Is Checked for Quality
Once the old mortar has been removed, the bricks move on to the second stage of our process: quality inspection.
This is where we assess the condition of the individual bricks and remove those that don't meet our standards.
Rather than treating a pallet of reclaimed bricks as one uniform product, our team looks at the individual bricks themselves.
What Do We Look For?
During our inspection process, we look for issues including:
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Missing faces
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Severely damaged corners
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Excessively uneven corners
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Unsuitable or badly damaged edges
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Significant damage that affects the brick's suitability
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Bricks that don't meet our required standard for appearance
Reclaimed bricks will naturally show some signs of age. Small variations, weathering and imperfections can be part of their charm.
However, we don't want significant damage to be mistaken for character.
Our quality-control process allows us to distinguish between the natural features expected from reclaimed materials and bricks that are simply not suitable for the selection.
Removing Bricks That Don't Meet Our Standard
If a brick has a missing face, badly damaged corners or unsuitable edges, it doesn't simply get included because it is part of the batch.
It is removed from the selection.
This is an important part of maintaining consistency and is one of the reasons we put so much emphasis on individual inspection.
The result is a selection of reclaimed bricks that has been through a proper quality-control process before being prepared for our customers.
Why We Don't Try to Make Every Brick Perfect
It's worth remembering that reclaimed bricks are not manufactured to look identical.
If you're buying reclaimed bricks, you're often specifically looking for the character that comes from age and previous use.
You may see slight differences between individual bricks in:
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Colour
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Texture
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Weathering
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Surface markings
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Size and shape
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Natural imperfections
These differences can actually be a major benefit when you're trying to create an authentic traditional appearance.
Our job isn't to remove every sign that the brick has been reclaimed.
Our job is to make sure the brick is properly cleaned and meets our quality standards while retaining the character that makes reclaimed brick special.
Step 3: Carefully Palletised and Prepared for Delivery
After the bricks have been cleaned and individually inspected, they move on to the final stage of our process: palletisation and preparation for delivery.
At this point, the bricks have already passed through our cleaning and quality checks.
Careful palletisation helps us prepare the bricks for transportation and keeps the finished selection organised and ready for delivery.
This final stage is another opportunity for us to ensure that the bricks being prepared are consistent with the quality standards we aim to provide.
From the moment reclaimed bricks enter our process to the point at which they leave us, we take care over how they are handled.
From Old Brick to Reclaimed Building Material
Reclaiming a brick gives an existing building material another opportunity to be used.
Instead of being discarded when an old structure is demolished or renovated, suitable bricks can be carefully recovered, cleaned and prepared for another project.
This can make reclaimed bricks particularly appealing to customers looking for materials with a sense of history and individuality.
A reclaimed brick isn't simply an old brick.
It is a building material that has already stood the test of time and is now being prepared for its next use.
That's what makes the preparation process so important.
Reclaimed Doesn't Mean Unchecked
The term "reclaimed" naturally implies that the material has been used before.
That doesn't mean, however, that reclaimed bricks should simply be supplied in whatever condition they are found.
We believe there should be a clear process between recovering a brick and supplying it to a customer.
That's why our approach is based around three key stages:
Clean it.
Old mortar and unwanted material are carefully removed by hand.
Check it.
Each brick is inspected and unsuitable or excessively damaged bricks are removed.
Prepare it.
Bricks that meet our standards are carefully palletised and prepared for delivery.
This straightforward process helps us maintain the standard we expect from the reclaimed bricks we supply.
Suitable for a Range of Projects
Quality reclaimed bricks can be used across many different types of projects.
Depending on the particular brick and its characteristics, reclaimed bricks can be considered for applications such as:
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Brickwork repairs and extensions
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Traditional property renovations
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Period-style projects
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Matching existing brickwork
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New walls and features
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Garden walls
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Landscaping projects
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Restoration work
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Decorative brickwork
One of the biggest benefits is the appearance they can provide. Reclaimed bricks can help new work blend more naturally with older buildings, particularly where using a brand-new modern brick would create an obvious difference in colour, texture or weathering.
For restoration and renovation projects, finding a brick with the right character can make a significant difference to the finished appearance.
Why Buy Reclaimed Bricks From Us?
When choosing reclaimed bricks, you're not only choosing a particular colour or style. You're also choosing the preparation and quality standards behind the material.
At Cheaper Building Materials, we put considerable care into the process before the bricks reach our customers.
Our team manually cleans the bricks, checks them individually and removes those that don't meet our requirements before the remaining bricks are palletised and prepared for delivery.
We understand that customers are relying on us to provide reclaimed bricks that are not only full of character, but have also been properly prepared and selected.
That's why quality control isn't something we treat as an afterthought.
It's built into the process from the beginning.
Quality You Can Trust
Reclaimed bricks don't need to be perfect to be valuable.
Their age, history, weathering and individuality are exactly what makes them desirable. But there is still a standard that should be maintained when preparing them for their next life.
Our three-step process is designed to achieve that balance:
First, we clean them.
Old mortar is carefully removed by hand using a chisel hammer.
Then, we check them.
Every brick is inspected, with bricks showing unsuitable damage removed from the selection.
Finally, we prepare them.
Bricks that meet our standards are carefully palletised and prepared for delivery.
So when you buy reclaimed bricks from us, you're not simply buying bricks that have been taken from an old building.
You're buying reclaimed bricks that have been cleaned, checked and selected with quality in mind.
At Cheaper Building Materials, we don't just reclaim bricks — we reclaim them to a standard.