Architectural Shapes Collaboration
Congratulations to the winners!
Congratulations to the Winning Architects of our Architect Shapes Collaboration Contest
This fall, these architects will bring their shapes to life at Glen-Gery's Mid-Atlantic Manufacturing Plant where they will hand mold their custom brick shapes.
Stay tuned for their journey into becoming brick artisans.
“Causeway” // Annie Durden, Robinson Strong, Sam Johnson
(Ennead Architects)
With a pentagonal profile inspired by natural basalt formations, Causeway is a modular brick that assembles into a rhythmic, crystalline field, echoing the tectonic beauty of columnar lava landscapes. Through various orientations, the brick can produce vertically fluted surfaces or pixelated, faceted walls. This formal flexibility enables dynamic modulation of texture, shadow, and depth, offering a toolkit for sculpting architectural expression through repetition.
“The Prism” // Alec Naktin
(CBP Architects)
A single, triangular cutout on this brick’s front face creates a variety of patterns when used in different bonds; from simple triangles that provide visual interest in a conventional running bond, to diamonds when laid side by side in a soldier course, to bands of zig zags when alternating courses are laid upside down.
The point of the prismatic cutout helps it shed water, ensuring none is pooled or trapped in the masonry, and the removal of material from the brick reduces its overall weight. This fact and its design may also lend it well to contemporary construction techniques in which bricks are arranged into screens instead of solid veneers or monolithic bearing walls.
“SL0-PE” // Kevin Miller
(Design Collective)
SL0-PE takes the tested utility of a typical sill shape and pays homage while integrating it within the conventional modular brick coursing. While still able to be used as a sill and header, this novel shape aims to provide various textures, movement, and patterns without the need to change the backup of the wall. While the brick shape was designed with extrusion in mind, the shape also lends itself to hand-molding. When used as a sill course in either vertical or horizontal orientation, it provides visual relief around the opening while allowing the face of the brick to either be flush with the adjacent walls or overhang for maximum removal of water. When set in walls, the shape lends itself to a multitude of patterns that can create texture through shadow, or texture through mortar lines. While SL0-PE is only a modest deviation from the existing SL series, the updated dimensionality provides maximum versatility for seamless integration into any brick masonry project, regardless of budget.
“Swordfish” // Joseph Platt
(Hastings Architecture)
Swordfish is an asymmetrical brick shape defined by a sweeping curve that subtly disrupts the traditional flat plane of a wall. Its soft, fluid profile introduces movement and depth, allowing light to play across the surface in unexpected ways. Designed to be laid in multiple orientations, it opens up new possibilities for expressive, textured masonry.