Glass Block Blogger

Glass Block Design Considerations
New York, New Jersey, Boston, Philadelphia

Glass Block offers virtually limitless design possibilities. Whether you’re redecorating a room or building your dream house, the brilliant applications you’ll find from glass block are bound to inspire more ideas of your own.

So, what are the basic design criteria for using glass block?

Be aware that although glass block is relatively strong, it must be used as a non-load bearing material. All construction above glass block panels must be independently supported. Individual glass block panels must be isolated within their openings with expansion strip material at head and jamb locations with no loads imposed on the glass black panel.

For those curved spaces, you may ask how tight of a radius can I make with glass block?

Minimum recommended radii are dependent on the size of glass block to be used. The tightest radius recommended, measured to the interior face of the wall is 32 inches using the 4 inch by 8 inch glass block units with the 8 inch side oriented vertically. The other minimum radii recommended are 48 1/2 inches when using the 6 inch by 6 inch block, 65 inches when using the 8 inch by 8 inch block, and 98 ½ inches when using the 12 inch by 12 inch block. In all cases this will result in a 1/8 inch thick vertical mortar joint on the interior side of the wall and 5/8 inch thick vertical mortar joint on the exterior side of the wall.

For a tighter radius, our ARQUE® glass block which is a curved face block with tapered sides will achieve a 12 inch radius to the interior face and a 16 inch radius to the exterior face. By alternating other sizes of glass block in between ARQUE® glass block units, interior radii of 20 to 30 inches can be achieved.

Further Details

You can accomplish many of your plans on your own. But, if you or your contractors have questions along the way, Eastern Glass Block is here to help. We have over 20 years of experience in residential and commercial glass block design and installation, and love to share our knowledge.