Charles Brooking 48 - Building Survey Quote

Charles Brooking is a fascinating and knowledgeable collector of architectural detail, The Brooking Collection of Architectural Detail, and as Surveyors we find his lifelong quest to collect British building details unique, informative and valuable and a collection that must be kept intact for years to come. If you need help and advice with regard to building surveys, structural surveys, structural reports, engineers reports, specific defects report, dilapidations or any other property matters please free phone 0800 298 5424.

The following is one of a series of interviews with Charles Brooking, Historic and Listed Buildings Detail Expert, The Brooking Collection of Architectural Detail and a Surveyor where we have recorded his comments and various aspects that have affected windows and doors and other collectibles. The interviews outline how his collection started and built over the years and gives an insight into the amazing architectural features housed in his fine collection.

Surveyor: Please talk us through the evolution then of the screw.

Charles Brooking : Well the screw began I think, it certainly has a long history used by armourers going right back but in joinery terms although it was introduced in the 16th century, it didn't become generally used until the late 17th early 18th century in terms of fixing ironmongery. In that context and the screws were basically hand filed and they did manage to get something of a point but it was a very slow process and expensive as they were actually made by a cottage industry and in the 18th century. There is actually a paper on this which I have learnt a lot myself but I haven't seen anything written about it. There is quite a bit on the Internet though which is worth checking up on.

Charles Brooking : It didn't have a spiral. I have rescued some early screws. The points were not as good as the later screws obviously because they couldn't actually perfect the points you get now and then you had lathe turned screws which was a whole series of lathe turned screws. Hand cut screws went on until the early 19th century but by the 1810's were being largely superseded by the lathe turned screws. Then you find various patterns at I think around the 1850's when they produced the almost modern screw with the proper point and so screws generally before 1850 don't have points.

Rescue defined

Charles Brooking defines a rescue as saving a window or door or staircase that would be doomed.

Charles Brooking was a pioneer in the rescue of architectural detailing as many years ago it was very much considered a strange and an unusual past time to want to rescue old parts of buildings with everything new and shiny being so important.

I soon realised that the development of screws was an important thing and an early rescue provided me with a lot of inspiration because you had all of these houses being demolished at different dates and one could see the whole range of how things were fitted in and the use of wires screws.

On my first solo rescue in Surrey I thought I would like a complete, another type of sash window to add to the collection. I spotted a Victorian window with horns. Horns were the things which project from the top sash, the moulded pieces which were basically a projection of the style.

Surveyor: Were they there to help guide the window?

Charles Brooking : They were there to basically strengthen the joint between the meeting rail and the style, because that was a weak spot and when you had larger sheets of glass it became weaker. So although they existed in Ireland and they were used in Ireland and other parts of the country, they weren't generally adopted until the 1850's and they were basically architrave mouldings adapted like the Ogee.

Surveyor: Please tell us more about the Ogee?

Building surveys or structural surveys?

Cheap building surveys or being wrongly advised by your building surveyor

Cowboy builders and cowboy clients

Buying a house

References: TheBrookingCollection.com DartfordArchive.org.uk IHBC.org.uk ProjectBook.co.uk

Independent Surveyors

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Commercial Property Surveyors

If you have a commercial property, be it leasehold or freehold, then you may wish to look at our Dilapidations Website at www.DilapsHelp.com and for Disputes go to our Disputes Help site www.DisputesHelp.com . We hope you found the article of use and if you have any experiences that you feel should be added to this article that would benefit others, or you feel that some of the information that we have put is wrong then please do not hesitate to contact us (we are only human). The contents of the website are for general information only and is not intended to be relied upon for specific or general decisions. Appropriate independent professional advice should be paid for before making such a decision.

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Charles Brooking

The history of the screw