A supporting structure or framework, as of a building.

The problem with your building metaphor is that it is unclear what building method you are referring to. Pre-war housing was generally built with solid brick walls, which supported the weight of the floors and roof as well as lintels etc. Only larger buildings needed an additional structural frame and that was often steel. Modern housing often has a load-bearing inner leaf of load-bearing concrete blocks, or a timber or steel structural frame and a non-structural outer leaf of brick. The brick is now there for weather protection and as a decorative surface but not to support the weight of the floors and roof. One can use cladding instead, possibly brick slips. In either case, the idea of a structural framework being filled in with bricks and mortar doesn't really work.

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Note added at 23 hrs (2013-04-02 12:40:08 GMT)
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You are then adding to the confusion by adding the reference to a "foundation" as though it could include both the structural frame and the bricks and mortar. Foundations nowadays would generally be concrete, not brick. The Victorians often didn't bother with foundations at all, just using brick footings, but they were fussy about grammar and vocabulary.