Under foot. A stone carpet.

A grey project for a grey day.

This is part of the project I've been updating here, it started with design work last spring and is now the last build of the season. The photo below shows a partially completed stone 'carpet' in the larger patio. What you see is a snapped salt & pepper granite ribbon border, random granite flagstone interior with a detail of 4 x 4 salt & pepper Belgium block. This is obviously before it's been cleaned up.

The stonework is taking a very long time due to the difficulty of working with the granite. It will be fits and starts now due to the weather window closing--rain and cold have dogged us all week long.

Current Project Update

Another work in progress—probably the final one until the thaw. The plan, originally included in my 8/27 post, is below and is largely unchanged from the presentation drawing you see below. I used Dynascape color for a down and dirty rendering. I’m not overly fond of the color module of Dynascape despite its ease of use, but clients love the drawings. I can save them as a PDF and email them or print them out full size. Even a very detailed drawing takes less than an hour to color up with this point and click program. I still prefer the look and feel of hand colored drawings, but they're more cumbersome to deal with electronically.


This particular project has been challenging due to the laundry list of elements to be included as well as the stone that we finally chose to use. Since bluestone was not an option, we settled on local granite that is quarried in upper New York state. It's got lovely texture and color and is available both as wallstone and flagging. Below is a photo of the patio seatwall, firepit and stone carpet in progress.

The patio is raised one step up from grade to create a better transition from the house to the steps I'm stood on to take this photo. We ordered custom salt and pepper granite curbing to create that transition. Each 8" wide and 8" tall piece was snapped on three sides to work with the rusticated look of the stone. The dark spots in the photo are dirt...not defects.

I'll continue to post on this one as more progress is made.

#19--Muck and Mire

We went back to work today for a bit. It was a muddy mess. I had to give Harry the dirty dog a bath immediately upon return home. There's three weeks to go and actually we need to be done in advance of that.

Yesterday, I went to a favorite perennial grower yesterday in the rain to choose some of the plants. It's odd, but when I design a project for a client I don't have any problem deciding on which plants to use, but for me--I go round and round and round. I did see and buy some great plants. Some are native, some are not. I deviated a bit from my original plan, so here's what I bought:

Ameria rubifola
Euphorbia palustris
Phlox subulata Emerald Cushion Blue
Eragrostis spectabilis
Festuca glauca 'Boulder Blue'
Teucrium hyranicum 'Purple Tails'
Salvia argentea
Aethionema coridifolium
Pycanthemum muticum
Sedums--Acre, rupestre 'Angelina', dasyphllum major, floriferum 'Weihenstepahaner Gold', 'John Creech', 'Czar's Gold', 'Vera Jameson'
Artemesia --whichever looks best at shipping
Mixed thymes
Aurinea saxitilis 'Compactum'
Veronica repens

They also had some beautiful Yuccas...I forgot the Dianthus--damn!

Here's two photos of the 2nd emerging rock pile that will have solar panel hidden from view (by virtue of height) on the top. This one is eliptical in shape and stands about 5' tall. This and a smaller circular pile will look vastly different when they're planted. I hope we have enough stone. The patio stone is arriving on Thursday. I hope it's not raining.

#18--Stoned Again

A trip to Wicki Stone in Great Meadows today yielded the tumbled flat bluestone for the dry garden as well as stone for another project we're working on. That way we were mixing business with pleasure...

Frank (shown for scale) tagging a 1.5 ton pallet of tumbled patio sized bluestone.
It's not easy to find pieces this size that are tumbled.

These big bad babies will be set in pea gravel to make a random level walking surface.

#9--Downpour

The day started out grey and by mid morning became one of the worst rainstorms I've seen in a while. Pouring, pouring, pouring. Dan Lupino and I had an appointment to tag stone for the arch and figure out just how we're going to build it and of course it started storming about 15 minutes before.

I stopped to pick up some carpenter's crayons thinking they'd be waterproof and damned myself for leaving the brolly at home. The gravel drive to the mansion was a washed out mess and Dan, the stone man, was already there when I arrived. When I signed in the operations staff referred to us as the Druids, which I thought was a hoot. I promised to light a bonfire and dance around the garden naked on the night of the opening gala.

We attempted to mark the site boundary for utilities mark outs but the paint was useless in the rain. I'll have to go back when it's a bit dryer. We did discover the beginnings of a sinkhole about 20' from our area and will have to deal with that next week--you could hear underground water rushing through it. Retreating to the car for a dry meeting of minds, we fleshed out some of the details for building the first stone pile. It won't really be a pile because the arch has to be seated soundly. Dry stone construction relies on a solid base, so the area cannot settle or the arch will ultimately fail. So we figured that one out and hopefully arch construction will begin on Wednesday.

#8--Start Up

The weather has been iffy so hopefully, if all goes according to plan, I'll meet the crew and the excavator at the mansion today. The main goals will be to tag boulders for specific use, identify inhabited burrows and move the inhabitants, and generally mark everything out so we can begin getting it together. Weeds may or may not be removed depending on how thawed the ground is or isn't.

We start so far in advance because it's a volunteer effort and this work gets mostly done in between the paying work. It's supposed to rain again tomorrow so we have to get started asap.

Later that day...

Moving the granite medallion to a safe place
The 1/2 weird granite thing isn't a planter at all--I don't know what it is

Beginning deconstruction

Further Deconstruction--some of the boulders are massive

Today's drama included the fact that someone had moved boulders before we got there (the property owner) to remove tree stumps and I freaked out and the stakes marking the proposed placement of the gala tent--in the middle of where my pool will be, and one of the excavator operators almost tipped the thing over moving a boulder.

The day's goal was to sort boulders and to try begin to see what is going to go where. Tomorrow we'll mark out the basic shape of things and start placement.

#2--Conceptual Plan

I've shown a conceptual plan of the Rockery below. It doesn't show all of the detail since many of the decisions have to be made on site. Basically, the 60 x 30 pile will be bisected with boulders removed from the middle used to make a third garden. The central area has two tree stumps and some pretty extensive animal burrows. We'll relocate any furry friends to another area of if they're still inhabited.


My friend, Dan Lupino, a dry stone waller extraordinaire, will be building a sculptural stone arch on top of the largest garden. I've also included an illustration (above) of that arch which will also be used on the garden page of the show house journal.


The planting plan and other details are being decided on this week. Another associate, Michael Deo of NatureScape Lighting will be designing and installing a solar powered LED lighting scheme and 12V pond pump. You can see the solar panel in the top right garden--although its position and sized have been modified since this plan was completed.