Abandoned Shit Weekly Contest - №.19 - Black & White - #aswcontest - Brickworks (Set of Photos)

Here's my entry into this weeks Abandoned Shit Weekly Contest, №.19 (my lucky number) - run by @customnature.
This week's theme is Black & White.

Welcome to what was the old South Grafton Brickworks kiln shed. We stumbled across this place while we were on holidays in Grafton, it was down the end of an old country lane called Brickworks Lane. I have tried to find information on this location with very little luck. It has experienced a fire and I would have thought it would have made it to their local paper for sure. If it did, I can't seem to find it.

Here is what I do know... and what I believe to be true. The company is called South Grafton Bricks Pty Ltd, they are still in business as there are other buildings associated with the same company along the same stretch of road. After a search on the internet, it would also seem they have moved location to a more popular location in town but they still use this area as holding yards and perhaps some production, I'm not sure. The company started in 1958 and were one of four companies in Australia still making dry press bricks in downdraft kilns, I'm not sure if they're still practicing this method now some of their facilities have burnt down. Dry press bricks are the solid bricks without any holes through the middle, the way all bricks use to be. They say they're stronger bricks and they're easier to use if you need to make cuts as you have less breaks.

We did get out and have a bit of a sticky beak. It was too cool not to! There were a few sheds all like this one lined up one after the other. They were all lined with loose brick built kilns. Many of them were quite heavily damaged while some showed signs of extreme fire heat. The floor was vented which I find really interesting, I'd love to know how everything worked and how it was done.

We didn't dare walk into this shed with not knowing if it was structurally sound but we did have a look inside another shed further up that didn't have as much damage as this one. Up the back of that shed there were some unfired bricks ready to go into the kiln, they had all just being tossed in a pile, they looked more like rubble than bricks but they were really soft and brittle to touch so that was interesting to see. This is also their true colour, I didn't make the bricks black and white. After they've been fired they turn that nice "old style" bright orange.

Finally, here's a couple of other photos from around the grounds... just because they're cool looking. We haven't been back recently, the last time we were there was about 4 years ago. Next time we're down that way I'd like to drop back in and see what has happened (if anything) since we were there last. On street view of Google maps they still have images from 2008 when it was still in tact which was interesting. The image showed the kilns with large funnels coming from out of the top of them.

Hope you enjoyed...