Rain Bricks

Description

The Rain Bricks are structural elements for building facade water irrigation systems that store and channel rainwater in a built environment, incorporating the concept of the sponge city. The system is based on an extruded brick that can be stacked just like traditional bricks or attached to the wall with the advantage of being able to collect and guide rainwater. The water can be collected to create a green facade, thus enabling biodiversity or can be guided towards dedicated water collectors in case of high overflow. The project included building my own tools from scrap material and farming the clay from the local environment. Todays Bricks are usually highly industrialized / professionalized products. Through this project I try to show a design approach for the production method within the combination of craftmanship and common ressources, including open-source technology and knowledge.