Ecology, energy and sustainability are crucial socio-economic keywords, especially for the construction and real estate industry. In recent years, the masonry industry faced related sustainability issues intensively in order to keep its ability of operating in a market setting which is increasingly characterized by sustainability dogmata. Scientific analyses and studies on an objectified sustainability basis - such as established certification systems - show that masonry is absolutely competitive with all other market-relevant construction methods. Therefore, the first part of this paper deals with a sustainability assessment of buildings made of masonry as well as of other construction materials.
Concerning the design and construction of masonry, further selected aspects are discussed which are important for the competitiveness of this building technique. Outlining the simple yet economic pre-dimensioning with the help of load capacity tables is one topic which is of utmost importance for an efficient structural design. Additional aspects are the design of laterally loaded exterior walls with low vertical forces and the verification of basement walls under high earth pressure load. New and easy to use design proposals are open for discussion. Finally, the educational portal “masonry structures” of the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Mauerwerks- und Wohnungsbau (DGfM) (German society for masonry and residential construction), which supports the training of young engineers, is presented.