Course Description

Concrete Masonry Units (CMU) drive design innovation by offering human-scaled building blocks in diverse colors and shapes, allowing for extensive structural and sculptural exploration alongside optimal constructability and superior performance in areas like acoustics and thermal mass. CMU construction provides exceptional life safety, security, and resilience due to its robust resistance to a broad range of threats, including fire, high winds, seismic events, impact, and blast. CMU modularity and continually improved assembly design offer ease of construction for exceptionally durable and versatile building material. Furthermore, the dry-cast concrete materiality of CMU achieves a superior environmental profile and lowers global warming potential through efficient carbon sequestration and reduced transportation emissions from ubiquitous local manufacturing.

Learning Objectives

• CMU DESIGN INNOVATION – CMU manufacturers shape all-natural materials into various types of human-scaled building blocks. Widespread in contemporary designs, its variety of colors, shapes, and sizes unlocks significant potential for structural and sculptural explorations, allowing architects to creatively push the boundaries of both form and function.
• LIFE SAFETY WITH CMU – CMU construction provides superior safety, security, and resilience, due primarily to its exceptional resistance to ever-increasing threats. It effectively withstands natural disasters—including fire, wind, flood, and seismic events—while it simultaneously resists man-made threats like impact, blast, and ballistics.
• CMU DESIGN INNOVATION – CMU’s modular and durable attributes deliver high acoustic performance and integrates with insulation systems, highlighting its role in managing thermal mass and thermal bridging. Through proper detailing and workmanship, this wall system utilizes shear walls, masonry lintels, and prefabrication to support both cavity wall and single wythe configurations.
• CMU RESILIENCE & SUSTAINABILITY – CMU’s dry-cast materiality achieves superior environmental impact, proven by its capacity for carbon capture and sequestration, resulting in lower embodied energy and reduced Global Warming Potential (GWP). These factors contribute to improved life cycle assessments, while its widespread availability and local manufacturing further drive down both costs and transport-related emissions.

Learning Units: 1 LU | HSW credit
Presented by: Steve Blye, Masonry Advisory Council

Event registration closes the day before the event.

Please contact Aubrey Cotton with any questions you have: [email protected] | 402-434-1830