FORTERRA BUILDING PRODUCTS LIMITED
5 GRANGE PARK COURT
ROMAN WAY
NORTHAMPTON
NORTHAMPTONSHIRE NN4 5EA
Tel: 01604 707600
Fax:
Suppliers of: Facing Bricks, Brick Pavers, Bricks, Brick Cladding Systems, Suds Paving, Permeable Paving, Chimney Systems, Eco Bricks, House Bricks, Lightweight Concrete Blocks, clay roof tiles, precast concrete floors
About Forterra
Forterra is a leading UK manufacturer of essential clay and concrete building products, with a unique combination of strong market positions in clay bricks, concrete blocks, and precast concrete flooring. Our heritage dates back for many decades and the durability, longevity and inherent sustainability of our products is evident in the construction of buildings that last for generations; wherever you are in Britain, you won’t be far from a building with a Forterra product within its fabric.
Our clay brick business combines our extensive secure mineral reserves with modern and efficient high-volume manufacturing processes to produce large quantities of extruded and soft mud bricks, primarily for the new build housing market. We are also the sole manufacturer of the iconic Fletton brick, sold under the London Brick brand, used in the original construction of nearly a quarter of England’s housing stock and today used extensively by homeowners carrying out extension or improvement work. Within our concrete blocks business, we are one of the leading producers of aircrete and aggregate blocks, the former being sold under one of the sector’s principal brands of Thermalite. Our precast concrete products are sold under the established Bison Precast brand, and are utilised in wide spectrum of applications, from new build housing to commercial and infrastructure.
London Brick
In continuous production since 1877, the iconic London Brick has been used in the building of almost a quarter of England’s housing stock. It’s an astonishing legacy for a product that is still made in the same way as it was over 148 years ago.
Today, London Brick is produced primarily for the residential renovation, maintenance, and improvement (RMI) market. The 23 styles and colours in its range are designed to match the five million homes built using London Bricks as owners look to improve and extend their homes.
The range includes a variety of colours and textures, from classic rustic red through to yellows and buffs. All the bricks are available in the standard 65mm size with four also available in 73mm.
Ecostock
Ecostock bricks are manufactured using the latest technology in sustainability and production efficiency, producing bricks with low embodied energy as well as advanced colour consistency, dimensional accuracy, and quality.
Alongside its sustainability credentials, Ecostock’s appeal as a housebuilding brick is enhanced by its rustic finish, simulating the look of a handmade brick.
We produce three kinds of this soft mud brick at our state-of-the-art factory in Measham, Leicestershire: stock pressed with a smooth, sand faced finish; stock thrown, which have a traditional handmade appearance; and waterstruck, which have a smooth but irregular surface. Ecostock bricks are available in wide selection of red, buff, and yellow colours.
Butterley
To keep your housing development on track, a reliable and consistent source of bricks is essential.
With a history dating back over 150 years, Butterley bricks can be found in buildings as diverse St Pancras station and modern housing developments. We manufacture it in a wealth of red, buff, yellow, brown, blue, and grey colours, and in several textures: smooth, with a consistent, uniform character; light textured, which is modern and uniform, with an indented or printed finish; heavy textured, with a harder and rougher texture for a more rustic brick with a consistent finish; and tumbled, a distressed and irregular shape associated with reclaimed bricks.
Cradley
Are you looking to match existing brickwork on a period building, add detailing to a new build, or create something unique and tailor-made for a piece of contemporary architecture?
A long-time favourite of architects, restoration specialists and housebuilders, Cradley Special Brick manufactures British Standard, non-standard and tailor-made bricks. They provide the detail that can transform the ordinary into the extraordinary and, occasionally, the award winning. And they can help you to turn your vision into reality, too.
From angle and cant to plinth and bullnose bricks as well as bat and swift boxes, air bricks, copings and capping’s, and decorative bricks for renovation and restoration.
Red Bank
Whatever its architectural style, Red Bank manufactures all the clay ware essentials you need to make your project a success. From clay roof ridges, air bricks and liners through to round and cannon top chimney pots and concrete flue systems, and much more besides.
The skilled and knowledgeable team can also design and craft bespoke clay ware products using traditional methods passed down through generations of workers over the course of our 100-year history.
The off-the-shelf range includes clay roof and ridge tiles, chimney pots, air bricks and ducts and flue systems. However, if you can’t find what you’re looking we also offer a bespoke service. Our craftsmen are skilled in designing and crafting bespoke products for listed buildings and restoration projects of all kinds of architectural style.
Thermalite
While the Thermalite brand might have been around for 70 years or so, a programme of continual research and development ensures it meets the needs of the modern construction industry.
A closed micro-cellular structure, featuring tiny pockets of trapped air, gives Thermalite its distinctive features: high thermal and sound insulation, lightness for handling, high compressive strength, and fire and moisture resistance. With sustainability targets becoming ever more important, Thermalite’s excellent thermal insulation properties make U-value targets easier to achieve and can help reduce the CO2 emissions during a building’s life.
Conbloc
If you’re looking for an aggregate concrete block that is both workhorse and aesthetically pleasing, you will find it in the Conbloc range.
Offering excellent sound insulation, high compressive strength, and thermal mass, backed up by technical support from our experienced team, Conbloc aggregate concrete blocks will help you meet building regulations for thermal and acoustic efficiency with ease.
Conbloc aggregate blocks are available in a variety of densities, strengths, sizes, and configurations to suit internal and external applications, above or below ground. Both the Conbloc Evalast dense and Conbloc Fenlite lightweight aggregate blocks ranges are available in paint grade and background blocks with coursing units, which can be used in all situations where durable, robust blockwork is required.
Bison Precast
Everything we do is built around our customers. Bison Precast is ready to meet your requirements, whatever your sector. From housebuilding and commercial to infrastructure and stadia, there’s never been a better time to build with Bison.
Formpave
Whether your next project is a single driveway, an entire carpark, or an adoptable road, aesthetics is an important factor. But so too is managing flood risk and meeting legislative and sustainability requirements.
Formpave can help you to fulfil all these project goals. The Formpave range of concrete permeable paving products can be used alone or with Aquaflow SuDS, the patented, award-winning sustainable urban drainage system we pioneered over 20 years ago and which many have sought to emulate. Formpave’s collection of permeable and standard concrete paving products is all designed and manufactured right here in the UK.
Further information, design inspiration and our brand-new Specifier Academy visit the Forterra website.
Choosing the right brick for your project: The complete guide
Why should you consider matching bricks?
New brickwork will stand out if the new bricks don’t match the existing ones and it can ruin the kerb appeal of a property and potentially make the property less appealing when it comes to selling further down the line. On projects such as extensions, you may find it’s requested that materials of similar quality and appearance are used which could include the use of matching facing bricks.
When it comes to repair, maintenance and improvement projects, it pays to ensure that the work carried out by a professional tradesperson will appear as seamless as possible – this is a sign of quality and consideration to the preservation of the original building design. With this in mind, matching bricks to your project is of paramount importance.
Step 1:
Identifying bricks: what’s the challenge?
Clay bricks, like any building material that is mass made product manufactured from natural raw material in a factory have a specific characteristics that help identify them as unique and individual. These characteristics can be split into 5 key areas that need to be evaluated and reviewed in order to match a brick with a high level of accuracy.
London Brick Manufacturing
These 5 areas are:
Size:
The standard London Brick size for example is 215mm x 102.5mm x 65mm, however some styles are also available in 215mm x 102.5mm x 73mm.
This is a common brick size found across the UK, so it’s always worth checking if your existing bricks match this or are smaller. Some concrete bricks that have added colours and pigments can be slightly smaller than this, a clue that the brick you are trying to match may be a concrete brick rather than a clay brick.
Colour:
This sounds obvious, but there are many variations of colours. There are common colour groups that are used in brick making including reds, yellows or buffs, browns, and greys, so the palette of brick colours is naturally limited. This means one red brick can be slightly different to the next brick, this makes colour matching an area where a high level of knowledge and skill is required. It is best practise to consult a brick matching expert who has this knowledge to help assist you with brick matching.
Pattern:
Bricks can have distinct patterns applied at the factory, these add variety to courses and walls to break up uniformity, giving a more visually interesting look.
Bricks such as the Claydon Red Multi have a distinct patch and fleck style pattern which creates a more appealing look which is best seen across the face of several bricks to show the full effect. It’s important to try and understand if your existing brick project has a pattern within the bricks, this can be matched to a manufacturer, and improve the accuracy of a complete match.
Texture:
The texture of a brick can also be matched, some common texture styes include; drag-faced, rolled texture, sand faced and rumbled. The manufacturing process can play a part in the texture of the brick soft mud bricks as an example are easier to identify as being soft mud as they generally have a more rustic appearance than extruded or pressed bricks. Texture can be a particularly difficult area to match a brick from as there can be slight differences in texture, which can mean a different brick. Best practise here is to consult a brick matching expert who can advise the right brick to match.
Markings:
Last but not least, markings on the brick will give an indication of manufacturer, and sometimes more details such as the quarry or kiln the brick was fired in, although it is becoming more and more common for manufacturers to no longer mark bricks, if your existing bricks have markings this can make matching much easier!
Weathering – or simply the effects of the weather and outdoor elements to facing bricks – is a process which changes the visual appearance of bricks over time. Weathering can result in a change in colour, as well as cracking, chipping, and patina. Understanding how this has affected the original brick and what needs to be considered for matching bricks is critical to getting a correct match.
Pro tip:
Consider weathering
Step 2:
Consult an expert; such as bricklayers, architects, and specifiers
Without extensive knowledge around bricks, and the experience of handling bricks and understanding production processes it can be easy to mismatch bricks. It is always advisable to seek a professional’s experience, this gives you peace of mind the right bricks will be sourced and selected to match your existing brickwork.
Need help? reach out to one our brick matching experts by calling us on 0330 123 108 or visiting our contact us page
Step 3:
Request samples
This part is the most important step in making a decision.
While images on websites and in brochures may provide a visual indication, the real version of the brick in the form of a sample will give the genuine means to compare to an existing brick.
Best practice is to always order samples, and try to match from these rather than online images.
Step 4:
Plan and prepare
So you’ve got a brick that matches what you’re current project is made from – that’s it right?
Well, not quite, take a step back, literally! It’s great having one brick compared to another, but no property is one brick high! It’s many, many courses, and these can be in different types of course bonds such as ‘Stretcher’ ‘Header’ ‘English’ and ‘Flemish’, this means there needs to be consistency of colour, texture, and appearance throughout the courses and walls
One way to achieve this consistency is to make sure you don’t pick bricks from the same packs for the same courses, as this can result in banding or patches through the brickwork as packs contain bricks from the same manufacturing batch, which may all look too similar.
The easiest option to make sure you don’t lay bricks from the same production run or batch is to take the approach of blending bricks; brick blending is an important consideration when laying bricks, this process is best advised to ensure the even distribution of colours and textures from new brick packs, and it’s especially important when matching bricks.
Bricks should be loaded-out from a minimum of 3 packs and it is advisable to draw from the packs in vertical rather than horizontal slices. Doing this helps avoid colour patchiness or banding in the brickwork. It’s best practice to order more bricks than required to allow for the blending of packs and variety when laying them
London Brick can help you with your next project.
Our experts can help you find the right matching brick, whatever stage you are at or project you are about to embark on we can support with our technical experts.
Call us on 0330 123 1018 or visit our contact us page to enquire.
Forterra Makes Contribution to UK’S Circular Economy Through Repurposing Brick Waste
FORTERRA MAKES SUBSTANTIAL CONTRIBUTION TO UK’S CIRCULAR ECONOMY THROUGH INNOVATIVE REPURPOSING OF BRICK WASTE
Forterra, has recently established an exciting partnership that reduces carbon emissions while making a substantial contribution to the UK’s circular economy through the innovative reuse of its manufacturing waste.
Taking a major step forward in its sustainability journey, Forterra has partnered with LKAB Minerals, part of the international mining and minerals group LKAB, to pioneer the repurposing of crushed brick waste to produce calcined clay as a low-carbon alternative to traditional cement.
Derived from recycled brick waste, calcined clay can be used as a cement replacement, known as a Supplementary Cementitious Material (SCM) in accordance with the cement standards. It brings a number of advantages, the most important of which is that SCM contributes to the concrete’s strength by increasing the strength producing compounds and in doing so reducing the porosity of the concrete.
Conventionally, calcined clay is produced by calcining raw clay at temperatures of between 700-800°C, but what is novel about Forterra’s approach is that this stage is avoided because the waste bricks had already been fired and the carbon accounted for in that process. This means that combustion emissions from the heating stage of the process are avoided, significantly reducing the embodied carbon of the final product.
To produce the calcined clay product, brick waste from Forterra’s Kings Dyke factory is crushed and delivered to LKAB Minerals, who then fine-mill the waste to a specific agreed specification, processing it into a reactive calcined clay material. Initial use of the calcined clay at one of our aggregate block plants in 2024 has resulted in a significant emissions avoidance of approximately 2,000 tonnes of CO2.
Forterra and LKAB Minerals will collaborate to manufacture approximately 35,000 tonnes of calcined clay per year, applying the circular economy principles of reuse and repurpose to these waste materials, making a significant contribution towards the construction industry’s carbon challenge.
The calcined clay partnership is part of a broader strategy to meet Forterra’s environmental, social, and governance (ESG) targets, including a 32% reduction in carbon emissions by 2030. Other recent projects have included the use of solar energy, reductions in single-use plastics, and investments in low-carbon transportation.
