Calling Someone a Brick Is a Compliment
A brick is a block of fired clay. In British informal usage a brick is also a thoroughly dependable person.
A brick is a rectangular block of fired clay used for building. Calling a person a brick is praise, not an insult: it is nineteenth-century British slang for someone solid and dependable, the kind who holds a structure together. The word arrived late in English, from Dutch or French in the 1400s, although brick-making itself is thousands of years older.
- A building block. *A red brick wall.*
- A dependable person (British). *You're a brick.*
- A dead device (informal). *The update bricked my phone.*
- Brick wall — an obstacle. *We hit a brick wall.*
- Redbrick — a category of British university. *A redbrick university.*
Word forms
| Form | Word | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Noun | brick | A single brick. |
| Plural | bricks | A pile of bricks. |
| Verb | brick | Brick up the door. |
| Adjective | brick | A brick chimney. |
| Compound | brickwork | Victorian brickwork. |
- The wall is two bricks thick.Construction.
- She was an absolute brick about it.British praise, slightly dated.
- The failed update bricked the router.Technology slang.
Brick idioms
- Hit a brick wall — reach an impassable obstacle
- Like a ton of bricks — with sudden force
- Drop a brick — say something tactless, British
- Bricks and mortar — physical premises, as opposed to online
- Brick it — to be very frightened, British and vulgar in origin
Middle Dutch *bricke* or Old French *brique*, a fragment or tile. English recorded it in the 1400s, when brick building revived in northern Europe.
Is calling someone a brick rude?
No, the opposite. It is old-fashioned British praise for someone reliable and steady.
What does bricked mean for a device?
So badly broken by a failed update that it is as useful as a brick. The slang dates from the 2000s.