Few weeks ago, we started restoring another old house here in Fitou. Long time ago, it has been a larger house which was separated into two houses as a result of an inheritance debate.
The separation wall was partly made with flat natural stones in gypsum and small terra-cotta bricks but only about 5-7 cm thick.
One don’t need much imagination, that this wall is not a very stable solution, not to mention the lack of insulation. There were also a lot of holes so we could see through to the neighbour’s house. On top of this, we need to change some of the beams, which are going through to the other half. Without a stable support it wouldn’t be possible.
Our attempts to convince the neighbour to build a better, thicker, new wall failed so that we finally decided to build a new wall in front of the old one and connect it with each other.
I never build a wall before, I mean, built some walls with natural stones in our garden, but never a “real” brick wall. Dick and Hagen took out a lot of earth and levelled the base, built a foundation and bought lots of bricks in different sizes: 10 cm, 15 cm and 20 cm width. The existing wall is not very straight and has some dents. We wanted to lose as less space as possible but create a perfect straight wall and we needed these bricks in different widths.
The first rows were surprisingly easy to build but as higher the wall grew as more difficult it became. After finishing a third of the wall, I needed a scaffolding and some help as it was impossible for me to it do all alone: mixing the mortar, lifting the bricks up to the scaffolding and finally laying the bricks.
Last week, the dream team came together again and we finished the wall in the basement. It is about 3,30 m high and 13,50 m long. I didn’t count the bricks but be sure, it was a great fitness program the lift them all up and place them straight. The 15 cm and 20 cm bricks weight 13 kg, the small 10 cm still 8 kg.
Now we need to figure out the consistency of the separation wall in the first level. May be we need to continue with building walls…..
