I Took the Plunge!

[MJ1987]

I have FOUR pyramidal stones!

In my (unsolicited) opinion, use the two in front to frame your front entrance in some way. One of my pet peeves (a have just a few) is directing the observer's eye to service areas (driveways, garages) or service features (painting your gutters and downspouts a contrasting color, for example). I feel that those areas should be as inconspicuous as possible, although current developer aesthetics seem to disagree, with their garage-dominant houses. A grand house would sometimes have decorative posts at the end of the driveway, but they were dwarfed in comparison to the massive residence. In the back, the stones could be incorporated into a garden design, although two is a tricky number to work with; two leaves little option but symmetry. I really like them - it's a nice problem to have and figure out. Can't wait to see what you do with them!

I like the idea of framing off. The obtrusive garages on newer homes are baffling to me. It's funny, when that trend began, my mom immediately pointed it out and said something like, "Why the hell would anyone want to make two garage doors the focal point!?" Nowadays, everyone is a builder. Sight lines and exterior features play second fiddle to open, oversized interior spaces. Nooks and quirks are a thing of the past. Back in the day it seemed like builders considered the curbside aesthetic first, carefully synchronizing each house with one another and achieving harmony. Quirks inside were worked with so as not to compromise exterior features (sloping ceilings, bench seating, little closets, etc). Now I guess everything plays more into the 'we' vs 'I' mentality in home-building, where square-footage trumps all.

I think one column will be used as a termination point for the retaining wall and the other on the left-most side of the property. The strip of land I own to the right of the driveway is so narrow that I really wouldn't want to squeeze a column in there. Shifting it to the left side of the driveway will integrate it into the wall and still enable me to "frame" off the front of my lot. As you suggested, James, I'll probably use the other two in the back, somehow. It is, indeed, a good problem to have!

[MJ1987]

those pyramid shaped stones are awesome
my grandad was a mason and passed some of it to my dad. He built a few different styles. One he liked was to pour a little concrete against a dirt wall behind , then set the stones in such a way you couldnn't see the cement. he didn't use mortar. then on top he'd build a little form and pour a cap about a foot wide. it would tie into the cement behind the rocks so that would be the only concrete showing. so you could sit on top if you like. each rock was stacked nicely according to shape and the back edge of each rock was set into the cement which he kept pouring behind. I think they looked quite nice not seeing the mortar, but maybe it would not reflect the heritage look with the cap.. You could use brick maybe? I liked the way he did it so that the grout didn't show and so there would be some gaps that caused shadow areas.. The rocks he used were granite and we used to go collect them locally when there were no rules about doing that. He'd break some of them with a sledge hammer if he wanted but many were just used as found. none were rounded river rocks , he only took the rough ones, the river rock walls have a different look. a lot of the old english style ones seem to have a pretty consistent 3/4" grout lines and they always seem to be rough , so cut with hammers and chisels mainly. so they had to play with the shapes a bit and break them a bit to get the grout lines to work out like that. The pyramids will create the old style so the technique should reflect that I think.. but maybe hiding the grout would be ok and I guess it isn't' like brick, the rocks don't mind cement as they are more dimensionally stable than brick I think.

Funny that you mentioned the method of your dad and granddad--it's the same method Saturday's landscape architect suggested he'd use. He did say, however, that I might be able to see some of the mortar from the front of the wall, since it can "drip" through in some spots with larger voids between stones. I hadn't given much thought to capping the wall, but I can surely envision the concrete work you describe. If I do decide on a cap, it would need to be done with a cement that's got a high small-pebble content, to help match that washed out sidewalk look. Sort of like the pic attached.

I think the main thing I'm most concerned with is how it will blend with the property and surroundings. My worst nightmare is a wall that looks like it was built in 2018. I know it sounds silly, since it will be built in 2018, but the "grown-in" look is what I'm really going for.

[Lily left the valley]

I think the main thing I'm most concerned with is how it will blend with the property and surroundings. My worst nightmare is a wall that looks like it was built in 2018. I know it sounds silly, since it will be built in 2018, but the "grown-in" look is what I'm really going for.

I don't think that sounds silly at all. I believe there is also a term for it, like "sensitive to the period" or some such.

If one goes to great lengths to try to match replacement patch siding with what is there, or getting wavy glass for fixing 1 of a 12 over 1, or what have you to help it seamlessly blend in, why would stone based surfaces be any different? Perfectly sound logic to me.

[Manalto]

Perfectly sound logic to me.

To me, too.

Love pebble concrete. I had a walkway of it surrounding a house I lived in years ago, so in the evening you could go outside barefoot and walk around on the cool stones. My understanding is that pebble concrete requires an experienced person who knows how to wash off the concrete at the right moment to expose the pebbles without over-doing or under-doing it.

[phil]

It's called exposed aggregate. I heard it was done by adding a sugar to the forms prior to the pour but you could look into that more. It can be done by washing and pressure washing, or using an acid, timing is important.
often this is done on driveways, but with concrete walls maybe the forms cant' be taken down so quickly? The techniques might vary.
this company sells a product for this.
http://www.brickform.com/Products/SurfaceDeactivator/

sometimes people do driveways like this and then put on a sealer. it can be slippery under frosty conditions, not a problem for a wall but I have heard of people conditioning their driveways then having trouble with that. I guess the type and size of aggregate makes a difference, you might not want river run rock? a lot of older concrete work has less refined aggregate as it came from natural sources rather than the modern processing equipment so sometimes you see big rocks and whatnot rather than consistency as we'd usually see now. If you are calling a cement truck then you might talk to them or if you mix it yourself maybe you could use gravel found locally instead of "navvy jack" or "crusher dust" maybe add pea gravel to the mix if you want to see rounded ones or mix it up to create a more inconsistent aggregate to mimic older concrete. throw a little colored gravel in to break the consistency, maybe some different colored rocks.

One technique I tried. you cut sticks that have tapered edges and nail them to the forms, then when you strip the form , the strips stay on the forms and create a pattern. I tried this on a little wall and I guess I stripped the form a bit too quickly and some little chunks stuck to the form.. so what I did was while it was still not fully hard I used a hammer and just hit the wall everywhere and roughened the surface by intentionally chipping the entire surface. I was pleased with the roughened look I had created and left it like that.

Phil

[Manalto]

My worst nightmare is a wall that looks like it was built in 2018.

Surely that's not your worst nightmare.

One good thing about materials and techniques that are not currently fashionable, exposed aggregate included (probably because of the skill required), is that they won't scream "Home Depot 2018!" Home improvement stores offer a lot of attractive options (albeit, no color) but some of the trendy ones will look dated in a few years. I'm not rigid about period-correctness, but it's nice when something harmonizes - and isn't a glaring anachronism.

[phil]

It might vary by area. a lot of high end houses here have it on the driveways. what I find drives me crazy is that almost every new house has the same type of wall out front. they are concrete on the bottom with short posts and some sort of powdercoated black railings about 2" high. they pour the slab then laminate it with stone. One would look ok but every second house here has one of these stupid ugly walls surrounding it. I have no idea why. they are super easy to climb so they don't offer security and they look pretty ugly. You almost never see nice new rock walls here. lots of old ones.

Just make sure if you backfill it that you have enough support and a way for the water to get out. I see some leaning because they didn't tie in right or maybe they add more dirt later and topple them that way. maybe some don't have a good enough of a foundation. you have to consider the final weight and how the soil might compact and that differs .

a worst nightmare scenario might be finding out you aren't on your land. it happens. my brother lived on a street where someone realized every property on the street was shifted 4 feet due to a surveying mistake early on so they then all owned 4 new feet on one side and lost 4 on the other.. oops

[awomanwithahammer]

a worst nightmare scenario might be finding out you aren't on your land. it happens. my brother lived on a street where someone realized every property on the street was shifted 4 feet due to a surveying mistake early on so they then all owned 4 new feet on one side and lost 4 on the other.. oops

Oh, man! Seems like the easiest thing to do would have been to just accept the original survey and move on.

[phil]

It happened when the city was digging up the old wooden sewer pipes and replacing them. I think finding the mistake caused a legal issue where they all discovered that they all owned to the new boundaries so it would have actually been a legal mess to buy and sell all these slices of land to each other and what actually happened was people started just taking what was now legally theirs. Not sure if any of the houses were built on the boundary. probably the guy that made the error was long gone so there was really no legal recourse, at least not an easy one. once one guy moved his fence they all started to follow suit.
My dad worked on a tilt slab warehouse where it was discovered that the plan was out 6 inches. because it was commercial it was built to the property line. I think they had to move the whole wall at huge expense.
my place has a little concrete wall the PO made and it is just basically a footing for the fence. my neighbor wanted a new fence and wanted to replace my old wooden one wit their new black fence made from stuff like hardiboard. I said put it on your own land it doesn't fit with the heritage look of my house. and kept my wooden fence. Since my land is a bit higher I can build a fence to hide theirs if I want to. Now we have two fences back to back but it's ok. If I had gone with it I would have lost some land at least visually. luckily we didn't make a big argument of it. If it had been a wood fence like mine are I wouldn't have minded so much but this particular fence is big and black and surrounds their lot so visually you know who it belongs to.

[Manalto]

We really are often at the mercy of our neighbors' tastes, aren't we? Down the street from me (in Alabama) is a house with a steeply-pitched roof and other English cottage design elements, painted a soft blue-green with ivory half-timbering. It's charming. Surrounding the front yard (and in clear violation of historic district code) is a bright-white plastic "picket" fence that screams in contrast to the mellow appearance of the house. (The what-the-hell-were-they-thinking file gets a little fatter.) It suggests to me that the historic commission is pretty much powerless to enforce their guidelines. I'd like to find out what the consequences/repercussions/penalties are for those who violate them. Maybe this topic is worthy of a new thread?