Northeastern Homes » Exterior Projects

The Stone Walls of Westchester & Fairfield Counties

J. Jerrald Hayes — Fri, 12 Feb 2010 18:41:05 +0000

I don’t think its possible to drive through Westchester County (or Fairfield County too for that matter without seeing and thinking about stone walls. Indeed as we’ll see there are a lot of books that have been written (and photographed) on the subject. A couple of year ago when Martha Stewart was moving in up the hill from where I live in Katonah there was a little bit of local controversy and criticism as the masons rebuilding the stone walls that encircled her 153-acre Cantitoe Farm property built the stone wall "too perfectly." It seems despite the excellent craft and artisanship in the rebuilt stone walls they no longer had the aged patina, rustic appearance and character of times gone buy we see everywhere here in Bedford and Katonah.

If we can say anything about our passion and New Yorkers and New Englanders it is that we certainly love our stone walls. I can recall thirty years ago (at the time I was working as a stone masons helper) reading about local legislation being enacted to protect the historical stone walls that resided on public land from being stolen! In some towns doing any work on any kind of exiting stone wall requires applying for a permit.

Last spring I discovered an excellent article in Yankee Magazine on Robert Thorson, "New England’s Stone Wall Defender" (whose book Stone by Stone is linked to below) and an accompanying video VIDEO: Stone Walls of New England which featured views of stone walls from the book by William Hubbell Good Fences: A Pictorial History of New England’s Stone Wallswhich I’ve also linked to below. In the video we learn about just how important to us those walls are not as architecture but as archeology.

As it turns out that Robert Thorson runs The Stone Wall Initiative at University of Connecticut "a web-based resource for stone wall enthusiasts" where he explores the archeological and historical aspects of stone walls here in the northeast and the threats to their preservation.

In the coming month we’ll continue to look at stone walls but expand our view from the historical farmer’s wall to examine more architectural designed compositions and forms and learn about Random Rubble Masonry, Coursed Rubble, and Coursed Ashlar walls and more.

Sermons in Stone: The Stone Walls of New England and New York

by Susan Allport (Author), David Howell (Illustrator)

In 1871 there were 252,539 miles of stone walls in New England and New York—enough to circle the earth ten times.
What do we actually know about these structures? About the people who built them, and why they were built? Stone walls are not simply monuments to the skill of Yankee farmers. The historical record makes clear that many were built by slaves, Indians, indentured servants, and children.

Sermons in Stone is the surprising history of the walls, a story that begins in the Ice Age and has been shaped by the fencing dilemmas of the nineteenth century, by conflicts between Native Americans and colonists over land use, by America’s waves of immigration and suburbanization. Beautifully illustrated by David Howell, this is an illuminating and entertaining work of the first rank.

Stone by Stone: The Magnificent History in New England’s Stone Walls

by Robert Thorson

From Publishers Weekly
"To know New England well, one must know its stone walls," writes the author of this authoritative paean to the structures he calls the "signatures of rural New England." There were once approximately 240,000 miles of stone walls in New England, and Thorson, a professor of geology and geophysics at the University of Connecticut, combines natural history and human history as he tells the story of the walls and how they were built…

Good Fences: A Pictorial History of New England’s Stone Walls

By William Hubbell

For this stunning new volume, photographer William Hubbell has turned his lens toward New England’s ubiquitous stone walls. Beginning with the basic geology of the region and why New England has so many darned rocks, he presents a chronological overview of the varying styles and methods of wall building, and includes conversations with six contemporary wall builders. The result is a surprising and refreshing look at stone walls and at the history of New England.

Exploring Stone Walls: A Field Guide to New England’s Stone Walls

by Robert M. Thorson

The only field guide to stone walls in the Northeast.

"Every stone wall is unique and every stone tells a story," says Robert M. Thorson, the author of the first field guide to historic New England stone walls– one that helps you identify and appreciate those in your yard, neighborhood, and throughout the Northeast.

Exploring Stone Walls is like being in Thorson’s geology classroom, as he presents the many clues that allow you to determine any wall’s history, age, and purpose. Thorson highlights forty-five places to see interesting and noteworthy walls, many of which are in public parks and preserves, from Acadia National Park in Maine to the South Fork of Long Island. Visit the tallest stone wall (Cliff Walk in Newport, Rhode Island), the most famous (Robert Frost’s mending wall in Derry, New Hampshire), and many more. This field guide will broaden your horizons and deepen your appreciation of New England’s rural history.

The Granite Kiss: Traditions and Techniques of Building New England Stone Walls

by Kevin Gardner , Susan Allport, & Guillermo Nunez

n this elegant, literate primer, a master stonemason imparts the fundamentals of building traditional New England dry stone walls, along with thoughts on the history, aesthetics, and philosophy of the craft of placing stone. Author Kevin Gardner defines "the granite kiss" as "that instantly discouraging, and inevitable, experience in stone work when a fingertip or two fails to escape the contact point between two large stones on the occasion of their first meeting." In this eminently readable primer on the fundamentals of placing stone, Gardner distills 25 years of experience in building and repairing New England-style dry stone walls into clear, step-by-step instructions. In addition to directions on building basic stone walls, he also demystifies steps, wells, ramps, walkways, and many other forms of dry masonry. Detailed illustrations throughout by Guillermo Nuñez bring the stonemason’s craft to life. Along the way, Gardner considers the history, aesthetics, and philosophy of placing stone in a book that will bring as much pleasure to armchair craftsmen as it does valuable instruction to the beginning wall builder. 30 black and white illustrations • Glossary • Bibliography • Index.

In the Company of Stone: The Art of the Stone Wall

By Dan Snow

Dan Snow builds stone walls without benefit of mortar or other binding material. This ancient dry-stone method is experiencing a revival, and Snow’s In the Company of Stone is full of moody photos of recent landscape projects, some of which look as if they’d been part of the scenery for centuries. Snow’s poetic commentary and a helpful appendix of design detail make for an inspiring, informative book.

An Outdoor Cooking Island and BBQ

Andy Clifford — Thu, 14 Jan 2010 16:10:33 +0000

While from the photo on the right you can see it came out very beautifully in the long run planning ahead wasn’t part of the agenda with this home owner’s project. I was brought in after the homeowners had had already had a local mason construct the basic BBQ island to figure out just what the owner could do in the way of an attractive interesting counter top.

No slabs of bluestone or soapstone or any of the numerous other suggestions they got from other remodelers went over well until they found me.

Their first requirement was they wanted to roughly match the colors of the new(ish) stone patio and island and no solid surface material would work for them and they didn’t want a concrete top either.

To fabricate the top here’s what I started with and how I went about it.

The first thing I needed to do was build a frame of pressure treated lumber inside this island structure flush with the top in order to accept pressure treated plywood.

All my 2×4 framing was fastened to the interior of the frames using my Remington nail gun. I used a long 20′ 2×4 that I bent along the front of the curved wall by wedging straight pieces of 2×4 to the straight part of the wall where I fastened yet another piece.By slowly adding in straight pieces hammered into place with a small sledge hammer I was able to get the front piece bent as needed.

Next was cutting and fastening two layers of 3/4″pressure treated plywood in to place. Everything was glued with a polyurethane glue (PL Premium) and screwed with coated deck screws….After the plywood was was secured in place I had to round the front side. I used a thin piece of lumber I cut so I could bend it to the radius the customer was happy with. I then cut it with my jig saw and then sanded it perfectly to my line with my belt sander at which point I was ready to thin-set and screw my cement boards to.

After my cement boards were set and solid I added my fiberglass tape to all seams, cut the front to the same rounded edge using a carbide blade in my jig saw and painted on a product know as RedGard a membrane that will help prevent water penetration into and beneath the substrate and help keep the tiles from cracking due to freeze thaw cycling.

The tiles my customers selected and ordered were custom handmade tiles made especially for exterior use and they chose a custom made border tiles as well.

This was not going to be an easy tile installation considering this BBQ/kitchen island top was right in the sun and it was the hottest part of the summer with the sun baking down on the tiles making them so hot I could hardly touch them. This is no good for the setting up of the thin-set so I needed to bring some shade to the island. My customers allowed me to use the picnic table umbrella you see in the back ground. I just moved it as I went along.

It worked like a charm.

The next step would be laying out my tiles.

This too was quite a feat being they wanted certain tiles to line up in areas that was quite the head scratcher for me but as you’ll see it came together beautifully.

So next was setting up my wet saw and getting down to business.

The plan was to start in the early A.M when the weather was coolest. Now with my tiles laid out I was able to draw my layout lines, remove the tiles and start mixing up my thin-set. One thing I needed to do with these custom made tiles was to lay them out on the ground to work out an aesthetically pleasing and balanced pattern making sure I didn’t place too many dark or too many light tiles together. I needed to spread out the different shades…something I’m always aware of with custom made tiles.

As you can see with the border tiles they were made very inconsistently and I had a hard time deciding which tile to put where so I had the home owner help me make the choices to where they were happy.

In the end ”I” wasn’t happy with the way they sent those tiles to me but what can you do when you have to wait six weeks for an order to be made…and at about $50 per edge tile……

And on the left was the best choice of the placement of the border tiles given the shades we were sent.

Over all the project came out absolutely gorgeous!!

The large over hang in the front curved section of the island top had me very concerned so we had 3/4″ steel L-brackets made up. I chiseled away the to pf the stone wall enough to keep the top of the brackets flush with the top of the stone wall and flush to the bottom of the counters bottom. All brackets I bolted deep into the back underside of the stone island. Every part of this project was quite the challenge..

After the top was grouted I used a “grout bag” to carefully fill between the edge tiles taking care not to get any of the grout into the intricate pattern of the edging.

After all the grout was cured I came back and gave all my work several coats of a premium sealer…and this was the project I left some very nice customers with.