Why were glass houses originally built partly with brick and not all glass?

Answer 1

Some of the answers are partly right (ie to keep the wood frame off the floor) but the main answer is a cost issue. Glasshouses were first generally used by rich Victorian households about 160 yrs ago. At that time we had only just learned how to make glass in larger panes and it was very labour intensive and therefore an expensive commodity. So as well as keeping the wooden frame off the floor so it didn't rot, and because they thought it looked better, they built the first bit out of stone or brick to keep the expense down.

Answer 2

I don't know for sure but would take an educated guess that maybe it was a cost issue. Glass is and was pretty expensive stuff so I am sure the original builders figured they could still get the basic effect without using glass all the way to the ground. I should also imagine that there could be a construction element in it. Glass is pretty heavy as well and requires a pretty substantial frame (which would be wood in the early days) to support it properly and give it structural integrity. It may well have been thought that a good solid brick base was a good solution for building the structure on, cutting down on the complexity of having a full glass/wood structure.

I may well be completely wrong here but those are my thoughts.

Answer 3

Not much to add but here are my thoughts:
As said before glass is very heavy (a solid glass ball the size of a tennis ball already weighs 500 gramms). So the glass roof alone needs strong support. In addition glass was not flexible at that time, compound glass was not available and so it had to be made sure that the whole construction does not move with storms which would have broken the glass plates. Large glass plates were not available either and it would have been merely impossible to transport them - roads were mostly unpaved and I think everyone can imagine a horse pulled waggon bumping into a hole in the street.
The Palmhouse in the park of Schönbrunn castle in Vienna has what we can call a full glass facade but the structure is massive iron/steel and I guess it would not have been affordable to "normal" people especially when you needed the glass house for commercial reasons so cost efficiancy is another topic. Nowadays often plastic is used for greenhouses instead of glass so you can use much lighter frames (aluminium).

Answer 4

Back in days gone by they did not have the advantage of modern materials like aluminium and the frames for the glass were of wood. In order to keep the wood frame away from the damp earth surrounding the greenhouse a dwarf brick wall was built with the wooden frames mounted on top of this and then glazed..It was not usual to grow things in the soil of the greenhouse but on benches which would be high enough to benefit from the full light.With the advent of more durable materials glasshouses were designed with down to the ground glazing and crops like tomatoes and cucumbers could be grown in the soil beds.,or growbags. The other main use of older houses was to grow grapes, but here the vine was usually planted outside the glasshouse and the vine fed in through a gap in the base. The upper part of the vine with the grapes would be behind the glass ,sometimes very high ,to accommodate extensive plant growth.

Answer 5

Because glass is a lot easier to make now and in much bigger pieces.



To be honest I don't have a clue and this was the best I could come up with lol.

Answer 6

modern materials are stronger and lighter. to hold up the weight of glass, you needed strong frames/foundations.

Answer 7

a glass house CANNOT have a glass foundation.....

Answer 8

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