Masonry Mystery at Historic Menokin

At the Historic Menokin house, a national Historic Landmark in Warsaw, VA, a mystery is unfolding. The home of Francis Lightfoot Lee, a signer of the Declaration of Independence, the property is being restored not to its original state, but only partially, so that the craftsmanship necessary to construct a home like this can be explored with visitors.  With that in mind, Encore Sustainable Architects offers a peek a what restoring masonry work from the 18th century involves. 

How do you repair in place a badly cracked brick and stone wall with original plaster?

The design team’s solution stitches the wall together so it can be attached to the future steel frame. The illustration below shows how we started with a laser scanned and rectified photo of the existing wall, then missing areas that couldn’t be photographed and perpendicular walls were added.

Next, the difficult to see cracks and edges were drawn. Then the Helifix bars to be set in the mortar joints to bridge across cracks and connect walls together were illustrated. Finally, numbered notes with detailed instructions were added. The layered result provides a step-by-step program for stabilizing the historic wall.