Cleverly use glass bricks to renovate (add) some windows, barriers or partition walls, which not only increases the light transmittance and maintains a certain degree of privacy, but also adds some modern atmosphere to the house. This article gives some basic introduction to glass bricks, and uses a simple DIY process by a family to make a window to achieve light transmission and decoration.
Glass Block (called Glass Block in English) looks like a glass "brick", but it is actually just two sides of glass with a hollow interior. There is a shelf between the two pieces of glass, usually a hard plastic structure. The patterns and colors of the exterior glass are different and very beautiful.
Here are some glass tile patterns available for purchase
Most glass bricks are opaque but transmit light, and as the light source changes, the color of the entire glass building surface will also change, so it does not feel dull. The most commonly used glass brick size is 19 cm x 19 cm and the thickness is 9 cm. Therefore, glass bricks have the advantages of light weight, beautiful appearance, easy installation, and low price. For not much money, you can give your home a beautiful and modern look.
Some uses for making glass bricks:
Increase the lighting and the plants in the yard will look hazy and modern
This is a frequently used area, maintaining the privacy of the bathroom while increasing brightness and beauty
This is a patterned glass brick, and the entire wall becomes a modern work of art
Make a simple isolation barrier
Exterior walls made of glass bricks
Making glass brick interior windows:
Often in houses with medium- to high-density living environments such as apartments, many have only two sides, or even only one side with exterior windows. Therefore, the biggest flaw of the house is insufficient local natural lighting. How to "borrow light" while maintaining the original building structure is a question that many residents are concerned about. The following example is a townhouse, only the front and back sides have natural light, with the living room on one side and the dining room on the other. But there is an interior wall between the living room and dining room, which makes part of the living room very dark.
Design concept:
Open a window on the interior wall to "borrow light", but don't want to let air pass through. If you install transparent glass windows, you can see the furnishings on the opposite side from both sides, which will be confusing. Therefore, installing a "window" made of glass bricks not only plays the role of "borrowing light", but also forms a "colored window" with patterns due to changes in light.
Real shots of the renovation process:
The interior wall between the living room and dining room is where the "window" is opened
When sawing the gypsum board, you can see two inner frames, but they are not support beams for construction and can be sawed off
Opened window frame
A frame must be made inside the window frame. A friend said that after hollowing out and placing some decorations, it would look even more beautiful
This is a glass brick with a "wavy" pattern
After laying the bricks, fill the gaps with plaster between the bricks
Make a window frame around the glass brick
The window frame is finished after painting. Under the warm light,The glass pattern is golden yellow
Under cold light, the glass pattern appears light yellow, and under daylight it appears sky blue.
This is another side, the overall layout is not rigid
Budget and time:
The purchase of 24 glass bricks and four-sided frame materials totaled more than 700 yuan, which took two weeks of spare time.
Note:
The stacking of glass bricks is very simple, just calculate the size and stack them neatly. But be sure to pay attention to the firmness between the glass blocks. There is no big problem with one or two rows, but for matrices with many rows, iron strips must be added inside. I added an iron strip to the second and third floors and fixed it to the frames on both sides to ensure that the glass bricks would not move back and forth. If you are making a large wall, be sure to add horizontal and vertical iron strips inside, which will not affect the appearance but increase the strength.
