Before& after.

Our own jobs, photographed on site. Drag the handle on any pair to take the wash across the wall yourself — the brick underneath is what the customer got, not a retouch of it.

About these records

Every frame is a real Vastex job, shot on a phone in working conditions. What is not shown is anything we cannot read off the photograph itself — no suburb, area or duration is listed, because those were not recorded with the images.

1,400+

Jobs completed

148

Builders & developers invoiced

96,000

m² of brickwork cleaned

Storeys, tallest facade to date

Insurance claims made against us

Charcoal blend, mortar haze

Most of what you are looking at is not the brick.

Cement film sits on the face and takes the colour with it. Builders see this wall and assume the wrong brick turned up — it is the right brick under a grey sheet, and it comes off with a buffered wash and a neutralising rinse. Drag the handle.

The same charcoal brick corner after brick cleaning, with the brown-red brick colour restored

New build charcoal brick corner before cleaning, with heavy grey mortar haze across the brickwork

Matched pairs, 8 jobs.

Shot from the same spot before and after, by the crew that did the work. Where two frames are different views of one job rather than one wall twice, the card sets them side by side and says so.

New build

New build corner, mortar haze

Cement film across a charcoal blend heavy enough to read as a colour change rather than a stain — the wall looked grey-blue until it came off. Under it the brick is brown-red.

Substrate: Charcoal face brick
Method: Buffered acid wash, neutralising rinse

The same dark brick elevation after cleaning, with clean face brick and undamaged window frames

Dark brick elevation before cleaning, with grey cement film dulling the brickwork around the windows

New build

Dark brick elevation, cement film

Even grey bloom over a dark blend, worst on the courses the scaffold sat against. Windows and frames masked; the sills are the part that gets damaged when they are not.

Substrate: Dark face brick
Method: Buffered acid wash, masked openings

The same brick entry piers after cleaning, with clean brickwork and sharp arrises

Brick entry piers before cleaning, with mortar smear across the face, mid-construction

In program

Entry piers, cleaned mid-program

Cleaned with the frame still open and the roof going on, because the piers are the first thing signed off and the last thing anyone wants to bring a crew back for.

Substrate: Dark face brick, contrast pier
Method: Buffered acid wash, staged

The same black brick window return after cleaning, with clean face brick and intact pale joints

New build

Black brick window return

Mortar splash and dust on a near-black brick, where every smear shows and the joint is pale enough that overcleaning would show even more. Low pressure, no wand.

Substrate: Black face brick, light joint
Method: Acid wash, low pressure rinse

The same buff brick wall after cleaning, with an even tone and no burning or bleaching

Buff brick wall before cleaning, with run marks and streaking down the face brick

New build

Buff brick, run marks and streaking

Buff and sandstock blends show every run down the face, and they burn if the acid is left on them. Weaker mix, more passes, rinsed off the wall before it dries.

Substrate: Buff face brick
Method: Dilute acid, multiple passes

The same blank brick elevation after cleaning, with an even finish across the full height

Large blank brick elevation before cleaning, with mortar haze in vertical streaks

Large elevation

Blank elevation, haze in streaks

A single unbroken wall is the hardest thing to clean evenly: any variation in dwell time stays visible for the life of the building because there is no opening to break the eye.

Substrate: Black face brick
Method: Acid wash, wet-edge worked to full height

The same red brick house wall after cleaning, with bright red brick and the algae growth removed

Red brick house wall before cleaning, dulled by algae growth with paint and render splash on the brickwork

Occupied home

House wall, algae and paint splash

Not a new build: green growth along the shaded base, old paint and render splash across the face, and a downpipe nobody wanted repainted. Cleaned with the house lived in.

Substrate: Red face brick
Method: Soft wash, spot treatment, low pressure

Before

After

Detail

Grey brick, pier and meter wall

Two details off one job. Mortar dragged down the pier face on the left; the finished wall on the right, cleaned around a meter box and downpipe that could not be removed.

Substrate: Grey face brick
Method: Acid wash, hand-worked around fixtures

On the wall

One elevation, end to end.

Two frames can be cherry-picked. A walk down the whole wall cannot: the finish either holds for its full length or it does not, and every lap mark and missed section is in shot. Sound off — there is no audio track.

Want to see it on your wall?

We will run a free test patch on the elevation in question, and you can judge the finish on your own brick rather than someone else’s photograph.

Book a test patch

Or call (03) 9000 0000 · Monday – Friday, 7:00am – 5:00pm
info@vastexcleaning.com.au