Original version

BBC World Service Online

50 Things That Made the Modern Economy

Factual: Money

The stories of inventions, ideas and innovations which helped create the economic world

Tim Harford tells the fascinating stories of inventions, ideas and innovations which have helped create the economic world.

BBC World Service Australasia

BBC World Service schedule for American satellite radio and the Caribbean

BBC World Service Americas and the Caribbean

BBC World Service

BBC World Service News Internet

BBC World Service Europe and the Middle East

BBC World Service West and Central Africa Schedule

BBC World Service West and Central Africa

BBC World Service East Asia

BBC World Service South Asia

BBC World Service East and Southern Africa Schedule

BBC World Service East and Southern Africa

50 Things That Made the Modern Economy: Brick

Discussion & Talk

Factual: Science & Nature: Science & Technology

Brick

11/05/2019 GMT

BBC World Service - 50 Things That Made the Modern Economy, BrickSearch BBC

The humble brick has housed us for thousands of years - will it endure?

The humble brick has housed us for thousands of years, but how much longer will it endure?

'I found Rome a city of bricks and left it a city of marble,' Caesar Augustus apparently boasted. If so, he wasn’t the only person to dismiss the humble brick. They’ve housed us for tens of thousands of years. They are all rather similar – small enough to fit into a human hand, and half as wide as they are long – and they are absolutely everywhere. Why, asks Tim Harford, are bricks still such an important building technology, how has brickmaking changed over the years, and will we ever see a robot bricklayer?

Accessibility links

Programme Index

50 Things That Made the Modern Economy

Brick

Genres

Formats

Brand

BBC World Service Online

About BBC World Service