My wife and I have begun the custom home design process, and are having trouble deciding on the brick and/or stone combination we'd like to use. Some of the styles I think we generally like are the Texas hill country/French country look, but it's hard to find pics of homes we really like that also label the brick and/or stone that was used.

Does anyone have any recommendations or good sources to look into? Our builder uses Acme brick, so it will need to be brick/stone from Acme.

Thank you!

We used old Texas brick. Google them. Detering in Houston carries it.

txaggie_08 said:

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My wife and I have begun the custom home design process, and are having trouble deciding on the brick and/or stone combination we'd like to use. Some of the styles I think we generally like are the Texas hill country/French country look, but it's hard to find pics of homes we really like that also label the brick and/or stone that was used.

Does anyone have any recommendations or good sources to look into? Our builder uses Acme brick, so it will need to be brick/stone from Acme.

Thank you!

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If it's a true custom house they should use more than just one masonry supplier… and most architects who do that type of design for years and years will pretty much be experts in brick and stone.

Old texas brick is the only good looking brick unless you are spending a fortune

I do like the look of Old Texas Brick on their website. I'll have to see if it's even an option. We're out in Midland, and not sure if they have a distributor out here or what it could cost to use them.

It might be easier to pick your top 5 from the in-budget options and then drive around looking at houses with those installed. The Acme rep should be able to give you addresses as well as guidance on what brick looks best in what style application.

I've done that, and we've still had a hard time on a decision. It seems some we like are all discontinued.

I did find out today from Old Texas Brick that the Acme Brick here in Midkand is their distributor, so I just need to get with Acme and my builder and see what the cost would be. It looks like their largest sized brick is Queen, which will already be an up charge in labor compared to King size.

My memory is a little foggy but I think we had them make a larger version of the brick we wanted (Chevy Chase). We also had the masons do a "sloppy" mortar technique which gave it an older look...just fyi. Turned out great imo.

Sloppy mortar is most likely the direction we're going, once we can decide on the brick.

Just completing our completely custom build that is 100% stone. We are very happy with it and are very highly involved starting with the architect three years ago. We went with Granbury White Chop. Note that the same quarry will produce Granbury Chopped White, Cream and Champaigne….depending on what comes out of the seam. We are very happy with the Rick. Some thoughts:

- go look at actual homes when deciding on the rock/brick. They look very different in scale compared to small sample or pictures. Your builder's supplier should be able to give multiple addresses for any ones you want to look at.

- your builder should have more than one supplier. Lots of challenges getting materials right now. Bigger the builder and bigger the supplier the better right now. Relationships get the material.

- try to get 100% of the stone delivered within a few days. The very same quarry producing the exact same product can have great variation in what the product looks like depending on the rock seam that is being blasted. Nothing they can do about that….so try to get all the rock from the same seam.

- if you are using a rock that requires intricate hand shaping/chopping for each block…..really anything that is not cut….then know that each mason's style is different and you want to make sure you don't have two walls meeting that look very different.

- every pallet of raw stone is going to have some percentage that is off color. Plan and budget for that or be prepared to see some odd colors in your walls.

- disregard most of the above of doing brick or cut stone.

Good luck and have fun.

The dreaded double post.

That's a beautiful house!

What did you do with the back?

Mostly brick on the rest of the house, but the one two story section has a bit of siding.

HarleySpoon,
The folks at TexAgsNorth put out an APB for both you and the real harley:

https://sicem365.com/forums/2/topics/94619

I'm a poor so I can't PM you

Cool……I'll check it out.

We are building now, Old Texas brick was our choice.

Was due onsite July 28th, just hit town this week.

Wow.

Unfortunately I don't think we'll be going with Old Texas. Acme Brick told us they are a distributor for them, but the cost of brick is roughly double what Acme's brick is.