Stacey’s Miniature Masonry

Little bricks from Stacey’s Miniature Masonry come with all kinds of instructions, pattern suggestions and paper guides for spacing. They can also be full, dimensional bricks for stand-alone models like a fireplace or stand-alone wall, or what they call brickslips, thin slips of brick that give a real brick finish when glued in place on a wall and grouted. Just as life sized bricks aren’t exactly uniform in size, neither are these tiny ones. Therefore, there’s some eyeballing involved and adjustments to be made. Keeping the rows level is the easy part and can be accomplished with lines drawn on the wall. Vertical guide lines can be drawn on the wall too, but it’s the vertical consistency that can require sanding off a fraction of a brick now and then or making the spacing between two bricks slightly wider or narrower than usual. Once grouted, these irregularities seem to blend in.

Color is also a factor. I chose Stacey’s Multi Red Bricks that vary in color from several shades of red to a few that are dark reddish-brown. I looked at the whole wall as I went and tried to keep the color arrangement very random. The bricks also vary in thickness and finish. Some are paper smooth; others are rough. The finished effect becomes just what Stickley prescribed: a surface naturally irregular enough to cause a variation of light and shade over the wall. Absolutely no monotony allowed!