11 Aug Stone Stairs, I’m Your Huckleberry
I’ve written about being sore after showing off to the new hires- err, I mean “setting an example of the pace and enthusiasm” of our on-the-job workmanship. I’ve written about how fun it is to find a gigantic rock within an area that absolutely has to be a hole. That is to say it needed to be a whole hole, not a depression in a garden with a rock emerging from it. Ive also written a little about how my lead crew member is fantastic at setting irregular flagstones- its almost as if he’s working a jigsaw puzzle when he’s placing 200 pound stones. (I used to help him, now I’ve hired a helper for him.)
What I’ve yet to blog about is the fun project that Nancy incorporates often into the landscapes we do that are on a sloped property- the natural stone staircase. Its one of those projects that are really satisfying, both working on and completing. This is reading like blasé corporate infoganda, and I’m also kinda sickened by what probably reads as empty self-serving promotional happy-write, but this is an actual thought I have actually had. I like building stairs out of stones.
Our primary rock supplier, Marenako’s in Fall City, Washington has bunkers filled with what they identify as Huckleberry Risers, which I believe is a form of Basalt that happens to split in geometric shapes. They’re awesome at being used for building rustic stairs. Our cost is around $90 per rock, they bill out by the ton. Nancy pointed out the economy of using them to build “permanent” stairs: there’s no forms to strip like when building with concrete. (we’ve done plenty of those too).
Bluestone Risers
We also have done several with quarried and cut stone, like Pennsylvania Bluestone, Montana Ledgestone and bandsaw-sawn granite. Marenako’s fabrication facility can slice a boulder the size of *my Dad’s car into six-inch thick pieces, like a bakery makes slices of bread. That is impressive. They flame-treat the cut granite to get the surface to pop and divit to make for a semi-rough non-slip surface. If you are a Seattle reader of this blog, there’s a newish park on Dexter Ave along the hill climb that has an impressive rack of stairs made from a single boulder the size of, oh let’s say the Bronco OJ Simpson slow-fled the Brentwood popo, oh those so many years ago.
Summary: Huckleberry staircase, good stuff.
*My Dad’s car is a silly, tiny Scion. In a stroke of intentional irony the marketing department named it the Scion IQ. Look it up for a good chuckle.
Dad
Posted at 11:37h, 12 AugustDavid, my poor, confused son: sticks and stones may break my IQ, but, as Dr. Seuss once would have said, “Can you put it in your trunk? Can you see that this is bunk? If you float it, can you call it sunk? Just because you think it’s junk, fit for naught but Miss Chipmunk, you conjure bluestone, slate and granite, hoping government will ban it? But feats of derring-do won’t be rewarded once it’s known that you have hoarded extra piles of paving stone. The thought alone has left us raving. A fox on all your grouses! Hi thee from thy supposition lest ye face an inquisition searching for the stones you’ve hidden in the space between the third row seats of my cavernous conveyance. But ye shall see, my flesh and blood, how space efficiency will triumph once you ditch the rocks and stretch out in that spacious cabin dazzled by the glow of warning lights and air-bag sensors. No seats that sag or arms unrested in the cockpit of my as-of-yet untested steed. Indeed! Leave no tern unstoned when loading up with flighty creatures, but watch in awe how, stoneless and bereft of slate , my 10-foot roller skate can climb Seattle’s fiercest hills, its rubber band unwinding mightily, but not yet like a plane, so flightily. You’ll have to see yourself , for sure. For now, however, let me please adjure and wish the best (in wave and weather) until the day we drive our horseless carriage up your stairs.