Slough has a rich history of brick making and brick fields.

The previous Borough of Slough used the arms below, granted on September 3, 1938:

As in the new arms the swan stands for Buckinghamshire, the the flowers for the horticulture in the borough. The brick-axes refer tothe brick-making and the sign of Uranus is from the arms of the family of Herschel of Slough, and relates to the discovery of the planet Uranus by Sir William Herschel. 
The supporters are the gods Mercury and Vulcan and symbolize trade and industry.

Literature : Images and information provided by the Slough Library (AlisonD@sloughlibrary.org.uk)

I want to use the industrial connections I’ve made to produce a brick-making press or extruder (manual and/or automatic) that produces unfired bricks. 

The concept is to emphasise the intelligent use of technology applied to an ancient method of building. This goes back to the relationship between the Progress and Regression I raised in my dissertation.

(iii) Umbrella theme of ‘design as the connections between things.’ 

The localised, cyclical relationship between a dug foundation and the clay soil used to make the bricks that builds the house. This microcosm of industry will be reflected in the way my brick making device is manufactured; namely locally, joining neighbouring processes, suppliers and materials together. 

A locally produced brick press will be used to produce bricks onsite, reducing energy of transportation, firing, and waste materials in landfill. It also means that the lifecycle of the raw material is still intact and the process becomes ‘closed loop.’ 

A reconnection between the activities of brick making and brick laying which have been separated through industrialisation of the process over last 150 years. This localised brick press device could have ramifications for the tools used to build brick constructions and for the corresponding architecture. Perhaps there is scope to develop these designed languages as part of the project as well ? (time permitting). 
 
 

(iv) Other considerations: 

Sustainable context. Sustainable Slough; 

This project will emphasise the sustainable credentials of a hi-tech trading estate powered by a renewable power station that creates a device for producing local bricks that don’t require firing. 

Many thanks to Dr. Andrew Heath for his insight into Unfired bricks and construction. 

I visited the 'Centre for Innovative Construction Materials' at Bath University to learn more about the different means of pressing and extruding bricks. I also learnt more about the various mixtures and binders the students are working on in the Civil Engineering workshops.

Extruded unfired clay brick on the market current. This is passed through a heavy industrial extruder that use vacuums to compact the material further.

Experimental mixtures and billets for testing :

Various binding fibres are used including hemp spiv. 

Older manual press for compacting and pressure testing:

Modular Book Shelves For :

THE BIBLIOTHEQUE DU CENTER AERE

The Bibliothèque du Centre Aéré (BCA) collect books of interest that are out of print or missing traditional distribution channels. The collection comes in the form of facsimiles available on-site consultation, on loan and also in exchange (cons another book that may interest us). This choice of cheap facsimile instead of 'precious' originals de-dramatise the 'precious books reading approach'. And more practically, allows us to let the Library live by itself without inviligating. We count on the reader, the deal is in its hand, stolen items are replacable. Taking advantage of its facsimile situation, TheBibliothèque du Centre Aéré is obviously multiple, transportable and can be physically located in several place simultaneously (galleries, bookshops, events, or in a tree,...)

The Bibliothèque du Centre Aéré is in continuous extension, so potentially infinit. Which mean, that the BCA Furnitures (the one you will design) are the windows openned on this imaginarly bigger library. They house from time to time, from place to place, a selected sample of the Library. It's in a way like an small exhibition space (but a space to place in another space). A kind of miniature theater that belongs to the world of books and libraries. It calls on books, mostly (but book shelves houses sometimes other things). It's a space to curate around books. Another thing: A library catalog will be Published regularly.

THE BCA CLASSIFICATION SYSTEM ( The Curator constraints)

As every library, the BCA has a classification system to index and organize the library materials. It was born of the need to find an alternative to Universal Decimal Classification (UDC) used in most libraries of the world. The UDC favors archiving. It distributes books in hierarchical and absolutes classes that cover all the knowledges. On the contrary, the CAC (Centre Aéré Classification) is a relative system that promote transdisciplinary research. Due to its structure, it can not classify all knowledges and is limited only to those entering the Library. This system is intentionnaly designed to emphasizes stray, wandering idle and random cross disciplinary discovers. It also prevent an overview of the library to potentially extend it to the infinite.

Ceiling Storage for hoarders:

I went to Chichester to speak to Will Davis about his plastic extrusions factory. I wanted to understand the extrusion process better and talk through technical details of the process from the dies, to the temperatures involved, etc. etc. 

I've been looking at a freestyle form of plastics extrusion... more to follow...

Could coiling add strength to extruded parts?

Big Cain for Catenary Arch Project (?)