James Taite
@jamestaite.bsky.social
2.2K followers 1.9K following 1.2K posts
Stonemason in Ottawa, Canada
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jamestaite.bsky.social
Thanks for taking the time to read it Marta!
jamestaite.bsky.social
coo roo coo coo ca coo coo coo
Reposted by James Taite
michaelburchert.bsky.social
Load bearing clay masonry in Augsburg.
We can do 4 storeys since last year in D. (Again; this one of the defining building technologies of mankind.)

Mudbricks basically.
Fired bricks only where necessary.
What is not there cannot emit CO2.

Foto: ZRS Ingenieure

www.instagram.com/p/DOfstT0iJ2...
Construction site visit on a multi storey clay masonry site.  Ring beam on top. The whole site is covered with a  scaffolding and roof to prevent moisture.
Reposted by James Taite
nora.zone
cry havoc and let slip the frogs of war
jamestaite.bsky.social
And the flip-side to the lintel that wants to pass as an arch is the hidden key. Where the limitations of the stone call for an arch, but the appearance of an arch is unwanted, we get an arch in denial, with flat soffit and apparently vertical—not radial—joints.
jamestaite.bsky.social
Another window, originally of identical structure: in the process of replacing portions of damaged stone some of the false joints have been made real, and the left-most opening turned into a true arch, with a new keystone.
jamestaite.bsky.social
This window of 3 lights, with what appear to be 3 arches, is really just a pair of corbels extending from the jambs on each side with a lintel in the centre bearing on the twin mullions. This is a structure of simple trabeation/corbelling that wants to pass as a more complicated assembly of arches.
jamestaite.bsky.social
So sometimes stones are given false joints to preserve that aesthetic, to present the appearance of the structural system—the arch—that they deny. To what end? Arches take more care to cut and build than trabeation, often needing falsework to support the voussoirs until the arch is complete.
jamestaite.bsky.social
Quick 🧵 about false joints in stone arches:

Arches, in one sense, are just an answer to the limits of the material: how to bridge large spans with small stones. And when the spans are small or the stones large then you don’t really need to arch. They become a formal device, an aesthetic scheme.
jamestaite.bsky.social
Benjamin Brown House, Forfar, ON, ca. 1849

yer typical late-Georgian vernacular, distinguished by the mushroom-cap lintels masquerading as semi-elliptical arches, notional voussoirs incised
jamestaite.bsky.social
Nestlé, Chesterville ON
jamestaite.bsky.social
can't stop won't stop uh oh lizard stop
sandstone label stop carved as a lizard-like creepy crawly
Reposted by James Taite
tedmccormick.bsky.social
A striking thing about articles I’ve read claiming to “study the effects” of generative AI on student writing skills and consumption of information is that (1) they nearly always find the effects are negative and (2) most “conclusions” are still written assuming that we must use AI, for some reason.
jamestaite.bsky.social
LARMIER A flat, Square, massive Member of the Cornice, between the Cymatium, and the Ovolo, and jets out farthest, being so call’d from its Use, which is to disperse the Water, and cause it to fall at a Distance from the Wall, drop by drop, or as it were, by Tears, Larme in French signifying a Tear.
from The Builder's Dictionary, 1734 portion of cornice of a classical building, including larmier and cymatium, in the process of being cut from Wallace sandstone; standing upright though it's orientation in the building would be horizontal
jamestaite.bsky.social
Ffs can you hear yourself? don’t even entertain this as a hypothetical

“If they gave you a lot of money would you submit to your aggressor?”

The only purpose it serves is to normalize
canadianpolling.bsky.social
"If the US offered all Canadians full US citizenship and a full conversion of the Canadian dollar/personal assets into US dollars, I would vote to become part of the US"

⚫️ Disagree: 67%
🟡 Neutral: 17%
🟢 Agree: 16%

Read it here: open.substack.com/pub/canadian...
Canadians Firmly Reject Idea of American Statehood
Support for American statehood remains low across all age groups, even in more conservative provinces like Alberta
open.substack.com
Reposted by James Taite
jamestaite.bsky.social
Benjamin Brown House, Forfar, ON, ca. 1849

yer typical late-Georgian vernacular, distinguished by the mushroom-cap lintels masquerading as semi-elliptical arches, notional voussoirs incised
Reposted by James Taite
willwiles.bsky.social
Pevsner said that the destruction of Soane's Bank of England was the greatest architectural crime of the 20th century. A century later the Bank is putting the perpetrators up for parole. I consider the evidence.
apollo-magazine.com
Sir John Soane described the Bank of England building he designed as ‘the pride and boast of my life’, but in 1925 his masterpiece was demolished to make way for Herbert Baker’s bigger but more boring vision, writes @willwiles.bsky.social
The man who broke the Bank of England – and built it back up again
It is a century since most of Sir John Soane’s structure was demolished to make way for Herbert Baker’s bigger but more boring vision, writes Will Wiles
buff.ly
Reposted by James Taite
placesjournal.bsky.social
A mapping workshop with refugees from Homs, Syria, asked participants to draw their neighborhoods from memory, bridging gaps between houses to generate a shared image of a city destroyed by war. To rebuild justly, residents will need to understand this pluralist city as others have lived within it.
Memory Maps of Homs, Syria
A mapping workshop with refugees from Homs, Syria, illuminates the complexity of rebuilding after war.
placesjournal.org
Reposted by James Taite
drjacameron.stainedglassattitudes.com
A welcome surprise in my last-minute cathedral guiding was the new visitor centre at Lincoln Cathedral, with exhibition pentice on the back of the Wren library and cloister linking to the 1840s Deanery building by Simpson and Brown, completed in the Pandemic and opened in Spring 2021. Tremendous!
Limestone-clad front of window reveal standards linking the Wren Library of the N cloister walk to the 1840s deanery building which now houses the main cathedral café New gift shop immediately inside the W face of new building, with tapering trusses supporting a glazed skylight toward the N transept "Cloister" between the Wren library and Old Deanery, with pierced metal cladding to exhibition pentice. Cathedral behind with NE transept gable and the chapter house under heavy scaffolding. The pentice exhibition against the outer wall of the Wren Library, showing the panels of the 2nd quarter of the 12thc frieze from the W front, some original panels, and some limestone copies of are still kept in-situ
Reposted by James Taite
michaelburchert.bsky.social
Building with concrete fragments, new challenges for stone masons? @jamestaite.bsky.social
slaattomorsboel, Kopenhagen
www.instagram.com/p/C7j8JOwsEX...
corner modell of split concrete fragments forming insulated floor and walls