Masonry is the craft of building with individual units of stone, brick or similar materials, laid in courses and usually bound together with mortar. The term covers both the structural work of walls, arches, piers and vaults and the finer dressed stone used for door cases, window surrounds, cornices and string courses on historic buildings.
In Britain, masonry ranges from rough rubble walling and knapped flint in vernacular buildings to precisely cut ashlar on Georgian town houses and country seats. Regional stones such as Portland, Bath and York stone give each area its distinctive character, while rustication, vermiculation and carved keystones were used to add grandeur. Before the widespread use of Portland cement in the later nineteenth century, almost all masonry was bedded and pointed in lime mortar, which allows walls to breathe and move. Reclaimed masonry, including coping stones, balustrading, steps, troughs and carved fragments, is keenly sought by architects and garden designers restoring period properties. Good salvage shows crisp tooling, weathering consistent with age and an absence of modern cement repairs, which can trap moisture and cause the surrounding stone to decay.
