How did reinforced brickwork allow builders to make thinner walls?

Reinforced brickwork allows builders to construct significantly thinner walls by integrating reinforcing steel with brick, mortar, and cement grout.1

In traditional masonry, walls were required to be quite thick to support the weight of a structure, as design was often dictated by unscientific building codes rather than engineering data. By incorporating steel reinforcement into the wall structure—often within a cavity filled with a soupy mortar known as grout—the assembly gains the necessary structural integrity to handle loads more efficiently. This technique enables the construction of high-rise buildings with load-bearing brick walls that are no more than 30 centimetres (12 inches) thick, a substantial reduction compared to the massive, tapering walls required in older, non-reinforced masonry structures.1