How should I remove the paint to expose brickwork?

Question

My house is Georgian brick (about 1780). A garage was added and the part of the wall attached to the garage was painted white. I want to remove the paint and expose the brickwork. The garage is going to be converted into a conservatory.

The garage is totally empty so I was going to sandblast the wall, but is this the best option?

Speaking to a friend there seems to be variations on sandblasting, such as soda-blasting. What is the most effective method for totally removing paint and that will cause least damage to the brickwork?

The wall is about 4 metres by 3 metres.

Answer 1

Soda blasting usually will not take off paint, does very little damage to sheetrock. Sand blasting would work better with fine sand to cet into the smaller holes. Dont use the larger stuff that looks more like rock chips. The larger size rock will do more damage. Any time with open sandblasting you should wear a dust mask. With old paint especially prior to 1980 make sure to wear a respirator as there will probably be lead in the paint.

Answer 2

Sand blasting is generally too aggressive for brick, especially old brick. It would remove the paint, but it will also begin to remove the outer surface of the brick, which basically ruins the look of old brick.

There is a relatively new process called dry ice blasting. Instead of using sand, it uses frozen carbon dioxide (CO2), a.k.a. dry ice. The dry ice sublimates into the atmosphere on contact, and does not leave any additional residue to clean up besides what you are removing. It has a wide array of uses, and is used on brick quite a bit.

Below is a few before and after pictures showing that it is effective without damaging the underlying brick surface.