Ceramic brick has been red for centuries. However, Moscow was revered as white-stone, and in the historical part of St. Petersburg, where Peter I "turned" all the production facilities of the country, exactly red-brick facades are a rarity. "White stone" (hewn blocks of limestone) as the main building material was used in Russia mainly only during the construction of Vladimir. In Moscow and St. Petersburg, brick walls were plastered on the outside with lime mortar, while the facade cladding had to be regularly "renovated". Red brick house covers, perfectly preserved in the Baltics and Western Europe, began to appear in our country only at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries.
Nizhny Novgorod plant "Kerma" today rightfully belongs to the leading domestic manufacturers of facing bricks. "Kermovsky" brick serves as a "visiting card" of business centers, residential complexes, private cottages. It is preferred by both summer residents who have decided to build a "family nest" and professionals who rent out tens of thousands of squares of housing and commercial real estate annually. In the well-known formula: "Price - Quality - Terms" - "Kerma" simply keeps out of competition and does not intend to give up its position.
The traditional method of making bricks, in which it was necessary first to bring clay on carts, then create a uniform mass, then hammer each lump into a mold, then dry everything, finally burn and slowly cool in the past. Peter I could boast or be proud that when unloading the cart (which had passed the off-road about 500 miles!), A marriage was allowed, which is not considered a marriage at all by GOSTs and SNiPs: the Winter Palace is still standing. In those days, hand-made bricks had a colossal percentage of scrap (ground "flour" was in demand for the same plaster, for painting temple buildings, etc.). Conditioned products were used in two ways: the best samples were laid out on the outside, and worse on the inside. It is the facing layer of the masonry that takes over the entire load of winds, rains, snow, and city smog. It was technically impossible to measure frost resistance, compressive and flexural strength, color fastness, and a host of other parameters, which even today not every architect can explain to a six-year-old child.
The twentieth century brought simplicity to the process: on the conveyor belt, each worker is responsible for his function, the whole process is automated. In practice, it turned out more difficult: already in the 1930s, houses built of stamped bricks had to be faced with fireclay tiles (a Soviet invention lost both in technology and production).
The difference between building - otherwise ordinary - and facing bricks in Russia more or less learned about 20 years ago. They found out because the walls of the first creators of the cottages burst, or the structure was simply warped - efflorescence like foam, zero aesthetics. About building bricks - not in this material (today, large-format blocks are optimal, for example, KERAKAM 38 Super Thermo, a low-density alternative - gas silicate; classic ordinary brick, due to the requirements of SNiP and for a number of other reasons, is of little relevance). The requirements for facing bricks are completely different.
The 12 cm thick outer cladding provides more than just beauty. This is armor that takes on the blows of external elements, protecting the supporting structure from deformation, freezing, and natural aging. Facing brick must meet all technical requirements, have an impeccable appearance and match the color (so that everything looks even in the masonry). In the production process, quality control of all processes, ruthless rejection of substandard, logistics are important.
The Kerma plant was perhaps the first in Russia to understand the essence of the general construction process. Brick, which became a symbol of prosperity in Soviet times, lost respect in the early 90s, when it simply stopped meeting any standards. Variants from Western countries have been and remain the property of a very narrow group of consumers. All kinds of concrete tiles "under the stone" in our climate have shown complete inefficiency. But the simplest and seemingly obvious niche - high-quality facing brick - was empty for a long time.
The question arises: why did no one try to take the place of "Kerma" in time? First, it is difficult to debug production using a different technology. Secondly, making the production cycle uninterrupted by simultaneously checking, certifying and promoting the brand is expensive. Third, preferences in our country have changed about the same number of times over 20 years, and it is not easy for a new manufacturer to maneuver. Fourthly, ordinary brick is an order of magnitude cheaper than facing, and facing before the crisis was obtained 1.5-2 times cheaper than European. It is logical that there were a minimum of those who wanted to enter the market, and even guarantee something to customers.
Kerma was able to do the almost impossible thanks to simple things. Imported bricks do not correspond in size to ordinary Russian bricks, with which you have to tie up the masonry at almost every facility. If we talk about the difference in the price of an individual brick, adding the difference in the complexity of the work and the requirements for the qualifications of builders is already a plus. Delivery from Nizhny Novgorod is faster, you can communicate with a manager who speaks Russian.
"Kerma" was able to debug, feeling intuitively the needs of its consumers. A worthy classic series of red bricks was complemented by a “velvet” one with a matte surface - now both of them are called “Alizarin”. For those who want a light, "plastered" facade, the Wheat Summer collection has been created. Who wants to remember history and live in a house-hut, but fireproof - the Zaonezhie collection. There is also "Terracotta", "Straw", "Kashtan", "Silver" … All of the above collections correspond to Russian SNiPs and are not inferior to Western counterparts in quality, although they are cheaper and arrive to the customer faster.
You can get acquainted with the full assortment of bricks of the "Kerma" plant in the office
company "Kirill". The material is presented in three basic sizes: single, one and a half and euro. Non-standard items can be made to order.
All samples fully meet the requirements of GOST and Qbriks standard. This standard includes the whole range of nuances, starting from the plant's ability to provide the required volume and proper quality not even of bricks, but of pallets on which the products are loaded, ending with the compatibility of the same brick with mortars that are recognized throughout the world and have proven their effectiveness for more than a dozen years.
Kerma is a time-tested quality!
