Thinking With My Hands

Remembering how it all comes together.

2012-01-27T04:26:00.000-05:00

It was one year and one week ago today that we began assembling an unusual pyramid shaped structure that I had designed two years previously involving two triangular dry stone walls with stones laid 'on the bias' and leaning diagonally away from two Gothic arches

Sean Adcock was invited to join us back then too to assist with many of the measurements and the setting up the guide poles and string lines as well as helping in the first week of construction. The two larger boxy red sandstone bases at the ends of the triangle had to be set in the earth at a forty-five degree angle in order to lay all our slanted stones on.

David Claman was also there that year working hard and seeing to it that the original north wall was completed over the two weeks we were there in California.

David and Sean joined me this year again to build the second wall and create the cobble-pitched inner courtyard area.

Stone Pillows

2012-01-26T04:12:00.001-05:00

Robert Milhollin came by yesterday to install the two limestone pillows he sculpted for a dry stone bench on the property. Robert is a full time sculptor in the Mendocino area and a good friend of John Fishers another excellent sculptor who I wrote about last year in an earlier post. Hands of Stone

To put the finishing touch on the pillows and give them a darker hue and water resistant luster, Robert painted the pillows with a 50:50 solution of boiled linseed oil and paint thinner.

Then I helped carry one of the soft, light-looking pillows down the path to the bench.

In their new setting they seem almost comfortable enough to recline against. The clever thing about pillows (and walls) is they will last much longer when they are made out of stone.

You might like to check out Roberts website.

www.mendocinosculpture.com/

Concentration

2012-01-25T02:56:00.004-05:00

Working with real stone all day building dry stone walls you'd think we'd know the real thing when we see it. Last night we went out to dinner at a friends house in Sea Ranch and stared at a fireplace discussing whether the stone was fake. We kept looking for clues , concentrating on the pattern, tapping the material, looking at the inside surfaces and studying for phony looking pieces. It was fairly well done work and there was no evidence of any duplicate shaped pieces. In the end I spotted it. Can you see the pair?

Crevice Gardens

2012-01-24T02:00:00.000-05:00

Crevice gardens are a variant of the rock garden. I don't know a lot about them but I do know they look beautiful.

They are literally vertical rock gardens and often mimic the look (and accommodate the flora) of naturally fissured and cracked bedrock outcroppings. Flagstone sandstone and limestone (or split layered granite) is bedded on edge at least two feet deep buried in and back filled with sandy loam or pit run. The rock edge faces are set flush to the ground and placed in groupings to create narrow crevices and veins of soil. Crevice plants don't thrive in good soil. There are many dwarf cushion plants that prefer this environment, including some of the most beautiful alpines. Sedum is also very fond of this type of dry rocky terrain.

Apparently cracks and crevices in cliffs and mountain peaks give protection to many plant species. Alpine plants grow happily in sun warmed natural crevice gardens in a summer that may last only a few weeks. The solar heat absorbed by the stone adds a few extra days to the growing season as well.

A crevice garden can be a great alternative solution to a typical stone retaining wall for accommodating the change in grades of a hilly garden while also providing an environment for some more unusual species of hardy plants. Just remember to plant things that don't need much water, grow slowly and stay small. You don't want to hide the stonework.

After all, a crevice garden is basically a dry stone wall laying on its side, buried flush to the ground.

Big Flags

2012-01-23T02:00:00.000-05:00

Big flagstones weighing over several hundred pounds can be moved by one person, even up hill, in the rain and mud. I had the opportunity to do some of this kind of grunt work yesterday as there was no machine operator available. The heavy 'square-ish' chunks of flag move surprisingly easy while long rectangles and huge triangles are almost impossible to roll alone. I brought up this one for setting in the courtyard area of the dry stone greenhouse. The more easily moved square and roundish shapes could take on a more dominant role in the floor design if it depended on just me getting the flagstone to where it was needed.

Feature Article

2012-01-22T02:00:00.000-05:00

Nice article written by freelance writer and photographer Liz Szekeres (eszekeres53@gmail.com 416 220 5278 ) recently wrote about the old dry stone walls in the Caledon area as well as the walls we built at our very successful DSWAC Rocktoberfest held there in 2011

The quarterly journal is called..

Sideroads

Building Double

2012-01-21T01:22:00.001-05:00

Last year we built a pyramid shape dry stone wall with a Gothic arch entrance. The sides were battered and the stones were slanted at 45 degrees to the vertical quoin stones of the opening. It was to be one of two triangular gable ends of a 24 foot by 20 foot greenhouse folly. It looked quite stunning when it was done. See Lending A Hand

We came back this winter to add the second wall.

While the first wall was a unique design and difficult to imagine how to tackle the structural elements ( including the setup of workable batter boards and string lines, learning the parameters of building 'on the bias' and working with the layered schisty material) it was even more challenging to build the second wall.

The duplicate wall (unlike the original) had to be aligned accurately to the other wall. The dimensions had to be copied, not just dreamt up, as with the first. We had to follow the placement and symmetry of every quoin stone, keep the uniformity of the original proportions and come up with a similar look using some remaining material that we hadn't used previously, in order to make it look the same.

The end result is looking pretty satisfying. The reward for our efforts is that the visual impact of the structure is more than the sum of two walls, even though the first wall looked quite impressive standing on its own.

Stones with new purpose and function.

2012-01-20T01:19:00.000-05:00

Several years ago Northumberland County asked for submissions of designs for a sculpture installation for the front entrance way to the newly completed Headquarters Building.

A dry stone sheepfold idea of mine incorporating large boulders was awarded the pubic commission. We used local granite fieldstone.

A new housing development company had amassed a pile of native stones from the property they had been grading and digging on. They looked as if they had been herded up and were waiting to be shipped to a reservation somewhere. I was pleased to be able to give them a home in the new 'sedumfold' installation and thought it was appropriate that the site was close to where the stones had lived for the last couple million years.

The finished sculpture was very well received and it has stood up quite well concidering it is situated near the busy public concourse. It does leave some people wondering what it's function is. I figure it's a good to wonder about the meaning of art and stone's function and purpose both in the landscape and landscape applications.

Flower of the month

2012-01-19T02:54:00.001-05:00

Rows of Stones.

2012-01-18T02:32:00.001-05:00

Straight bands of parallel bedrock emerge from the sand and disappear under the ocean bed at Bowling Ball Beach near Mendocino California.

It doesn't take an Andy Goldsworthy to see the artistic potential of these unusual outcroppings. The lines are calling out to be continued/added to, and then photographed.

However briefly these newcomer stones stay in these elongated configurations doesn't really matter. It is merely a gesture drawing us closer to some other function of existence. A reference has been made to something almost inexplicable.

As artists and workers in stone we long to be contributors to that which is beautiful. Rather than ignore it or try to destroy it, we explore it more and intuitively redefine the order we see in nature, particularly geological formations.

Point of View

2012-01-17T02:00:00.000-05:00

It is conceivable that the relevance of a person’s own point of view is proportional to the relevance of the view he allows himself to appreciate. Granted, there may not always be vistas to inspire us within walking distance, like the spectacular scenery one can see in parts of Yorkshire, but we can pause and breath in the beauty, if only from a photograph like this. The patchwork pattern of stone walls and pasture spreading out beyond our vantage point suggests that perfection may well come in packages or clusters. The particular scene we are enjoying, seems for the moment like it could not be improved upon and yet we know just a few more paces down the hill, or a further amble along the path, there will be another splendid moment. How can something so perfect as the particular stone wall we see before us be not depreciated, or conversely, become even more distinguished, as a result of its own rugged structural elegance appearing to be commonly reproduced throughout the countryside. Why is it so expansively satisfying instead of boring or exhausting? If it were just an abundance of natural wonders like mountains or lakes, or endless stretches of shoreline, the majesty would be no less spectacular, but when we see (something so rare as) nature, seemingly improved upon by mankind, and on such a large scale, we can only be amazed and a bit humbled, that the universe should let us participate in its propensity for enrichment rather than exploitation.

See Walls

2012-01-16T01:30:00.000-05:00

We discovered this lovely dry stone wall in California yesterday. Actually it was a pattern formed by the cracks in the rocky shore bedrock exposed at low tide near Mendocino.

There are many similar patterns along the mile or so of beach we walked. I can't help but think that the structural configurations of proper dry stone walls built in a seemingly random way are to some degree as inevitable and as predictable as these kind of crack designs in rocks, which like the varied intricate designs of living plants can be generated and reproduced merely by applying the proper fractal functions.

I added small pebbles for coping.

Another Walking Tour of Walls June 01-12, 2012

2012-01-15T03:52:00.000-05:00

Just thought I'd post this formal invitation today for you to think about joining me for a walk in the Lake District (Cumbria), and Yorkshire, England, and then hike the Aran Islands, Ireland, through an archeological and ecological legacy of stone landscape.

This event is hosted by Dry Stone Walling Across Canada

Along with about a dozen or so other enthusiasts you will enjoy seeing historic dry stone structures, hear the legends and the history of the castles, music and the traditions of the regions we visit . We will be trying our hands at building a traditional Irish "Feidin" wall in the Aran Islands. After a day of hiking the Viking walls amongst the flowering Lupins,we will gather at the end of the day to the warmth and charm

of a small hotel for dinner and traditional music.

Our schedule is to depart Pearson Airport, Toronto, on the evening of May 31 arriving the following morning, June 01 in Manchester, Great Britain.

From there we make our way to Cumbria in the heart of England's Lake District to join host Gavin Rose at the New Dungeon Ghyll Hotel. The stone establishment is surrounded by stone wall enclosures for the sheep and lambs, at the end of the road in the Great Langdale Valley, in the National Trust Lake District Park, Cumbria.

Gavin is employed by the National Trust as a trail builder. The best way to see the area is on foot and as he describes the valley..."the beauty of the place is, that it is literally surrounded by dry stone structures", including a superb Andy Goldsworthy installation. We can amble to Ambleside on the shore of Lake Windemere, visit Brantwood, the home of John Ruskin, or Hilltop, the home of Beatrix Potter.

We will also travel to Yorkshire, the area where walling goes back to the first farmers who cleared their land for animal enclosures and property demarcation and walk the unchanged countryside that inspired the great English landscape painters of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.

On June 06, we depart from Manchester and fly to Shannon, Ireland and board the ferry to Inis Oirr, the smallest of the Aran Islands, to meet our host Patrick McAfee. Pat was our host last year for our wonderful stay on Inis Oirr and we are happy to have him back this year. Pat has conducted workshops worldwide on the traditional Feidenwalls of the Aran Islands .The isolation of these islands has preserved the native Gaelic/Irish language and the traditional practices of farming, fishing and walling. This year we will be treated to a traditional meal - Dublin Coddle and Irish soda bread, cooked on a peat fire in a cast iron "bastible".We will hike or bike the island's miles of stonewalls and holy wells, and absorb the geology, history, local language, Guinness and music, always within sight of the sea.

On June 10 we will leave the island by ferry and travel to the medieval city of Galway for a two night stay. On June 11 we will receive an official welcome to Galway and a tour of the city and a local castle generously sponsored Galway City Council's Heritage Office.We leave Galway on June 12 for a midday departure from Shannon airport.Cost and Dates:Great Britain and Ireland-May 31- June 12 Cost $2689.00 taxes included. (based on double occupancy)

Costs cover all transport, ferries etc. Breakfast is included with all accommodation.

Space is limited, please book a.s.a.p.Flight from Toronto-Manchester, return from Shannon $740. dependent on booking time.The Walk the Walls portion of the tour and the flight portion are priced separately so those wishing to make their own travel plans to and from our destination may do so. Debbie at the Travel Broker can help you with your plans. We are designing this tour for the hikers, walkers or wanderers. Our itinerary will be as casual as possible.Our goal is to introduce the culture, the history, the ecology and for many, to connect with the stones of our past!

For travel information please contact Debbie Lloyd CTC, The Travel Broker, at deblloyd@thetravelbroker.ca or 613 389 7914 or 888 830 5324. For general tour information contact:

Margot Miller, margotm@1000island.net or 613 659 3415 or http://www.dswac.ca

Natural Colours And Shapes

2012-01-14T02:00:00.000-05:00

Dave Claman and Sean Smyth who work out of Missoula Montana were involved with an interesting dry stone wall project in their home town last summer.

Dave who runs a buisiness in Montana called Stoneworks first met up with Sean a fellow waller in Ventura California who coincidently came from Missoula too. Last January four international instructors including Sean Adcock and I were there in Ventura teaching a retaining wall workshop for the Stone Foundation which Dave and Sean both attended.

Back at Missoula Dave and Peter Mullins who came in from Gualala California began planning a special curved wall installation and together and with Sean's help they built a magnificent 80 foot long 6 foot high dry stone wall at Draftworks, a new brew pub that opened recently in town.

They used a beautiful coloured round glacial stone found locally. Dave and Sean spent many days procuring this material by pulling it out stone by stone from a nearby landfill 'deck' they arranged to pick material from. The wall, after it was sprayed down washed off to reveal some stunning blues, greens, purples and pink colous all typical of this kind of argillite. The whole project took 8 weeks and has attracted alot of attention.

Dave said he really enjoyed working with that kind of stone for a change because there was no way the stones could be shaped with tools, and so it became strictly a matter of finding the right shapes and fitting them together in order to build the wall.

Foam Fresh Walls

2012-01-13T02:00:00.000-05:00

A good painter can trace the beauty of any landscape. A waller is just a different kind of landscape artist. They work with nothing but rocks and have bigger canvases. From above one can see they are creating more than just a random patchwork of fields. The large flowing contours they define are really the outlines of expediency; the lines made by clearing and hauling the stones to the closest and often curving perimeter, before committing to making something ‘continuous’ of them. Instead of the pasture shapes all merging into each other, there is an ordered gathering or ‘crystallization’ of stones along the farm field borders.

Everything fits, because the walls, by definition, have dual functionality. They act as continuous borders on both sides of each field. The thin ribbons of stones between each field amount to nothing and yet they are everything. They are the decoration and the structure. All the interesting planes and surfaces of the land butt up to one another to become an organized and purposeful network. The fields ‘materialize’ out of necessity, almost like crowded bubbles forming in foam.

Outlines

2012-01-12T01:45:00.000-05:00

The thin lines between the stones in a wall are nothing and everything, in the same way a 'joint' can be defined as either a 'joining' or a 'separation'. This is the beauty of definition. This grasping of ‘definition’ is essential to our seeing anything at all.

When any area of interest is carefully outlined, it often produces a pleasing aesthetic quality.

Some of the paintings by the Group of Seven make use of this same principle. The shapes of trees and branches are often traced with thin ribbons of bright colour showing off the vibrancy of their contour, as if to suggest nature is perceived more perfectly when it is seen as being ‘held together’ by outlines.

The shapes jump out of the canvas, while at the same time nestle into each other perfectly.

Is it the darker outlined pattern in a dry stone wall that we pay attention to or the stones themselves?

Quarry Sap

2012-01-11T01:30:00.000-05:00

Stone which is extracted from the ground always has a certain amount of moisture in it. Even though this dampness is undetectable and the stone seems completely dry it isn't, and because of this fact freshly quarried stone material turns out to be more easily worked than material left on the surface for many months, mainly because of the fact it has this 'quarry sap'. Evaporation due to many months of exposure to the atmosphere causes the stone to become much harder and sometimes so brittle that it is difficult to shape. Freshly uncovered stones have a softer cores and more pliable surfaces because of the presence of this quarry sap and so it makes them a much more pliable material for masons to work with.

Some people say that sap obtained from tapping freshly quarried stones if collected and boiled down to a thick mineral oil, tastes a lot like marble syrup.

The Stone

2012-01-10T01:30:00.000-05:00

The Stone

I feel the stone

and through the stone the earth,

and my past,

and my future,

as I am grounded in my present.

in the ridges and hollows,

are the rise and fall of my heart,

as I live out my destiny.

to tell of the stone.

to tell of the earth.

to tell of the journey,

my journey on the surface of the stone,

I am but a dust motepitched from place to place

on the whim of the wind.

I scatter some seeds of poems

to be carried on the beaks of birds,

to be mixed in the whispers of the wind,

for the one who will hear my message,

and come to me bearing treasure.

the treasure of truth,

in that one lineof love.

DRAX

Rockin

2012-01-09T01:30:00.000-05:00

The Dry Stone Wall Hand book.

2012-01-08T01:38:00.000-05:00

Sure there are 'how to' manuals. There are good books about how to do everything, of course. I've made a thing of collecting books out there about dry stone walling. When I see one or hear about one I buy it. There are some very good ones out there. And there are a couple of really bad ones. One notable example is a book simply called A guide to Dry stone Walling, by Radford. The front cover alone should be enough to make you wonder about this book.

The number of rules that are broken just in the photograph of the wall they have chosen to put on the front cover of his book makes me think it should be filed in the humour section. It is certainly not the best dry stone walling handbook for those wishing to learn how to do it properly.

Discerning walling enthusiasts will want to get the book put out by the DSWA in Britain.

The thing is even a good hand book on the subject can't replace getting proper hands-on help.Getting down and dirty and just getting some first hand experience doing it is best. A better handbook may in fact be a book of poetry. The thoughts and ideas expressed in a good poem or a book of walling poems may touch you deeper and quicken your sensitivity to what it is that's actually going on when a person sets about trying to lay stone upon stone. Aesthetics is hard to teach. A how-to book will not help you very much in that department . Wordsworth, Emily Dickinson, Robert Frost or T. S. Eliot may come a lot closer.

依我看来 How's your Chinese?

2012-01-07T01:30:00.000-05:00

Fairchild TV or FTV (Chinese: 新時代電視) broadcasts info-programs in Cantonese 20 hours a day, 7 days a week, across Canada. They contacted me in September to do a short segment about Dry Stone Walling Across Canada . Their TV crew came to Caledon Ontario in October of 2011 for several days to film our Festival of Stone called - Rocktoberfest - and also took a road trip out to the Port Hope area to film other projects from previous annual Rocktoberfest events.

Thanks to Vincci Chung and her crew for all the work they put into this project.

(apologies for the annoying the skysoft logo)

Fractal Transition

2012-01-06T01:30:00.000-05:00

Bubbles, plant cells and other natural patterns can look a lot like dry stone walls.

Or is it the other way around?

Below is simple little fractal-wall movie for today's blog entry

Fractal Landscape

2012-01-05T01:37:00.000-05:00

I had a bit of a revelation on my return home from Britain some years ago, after having visited several dry stone wallers in Scotland and England. As the airplane was flying over the green countryside, it occurred to me that the beautiful patterns of walled and hedged fields below revealed the same fractal shapes as the contours of the stone which fit together so well in the walls I had been looking at during my travels.

It had been a bit of a working holiday that year. I had helped build two walls in Yorkshire and then went and spent some time in Scotland helping repair an old granite fieldstone dry stone wall near an historic castle.

What I was seeing reproduced everywhere in the landscape below, was a larger quilt-like pattern that I had been appreciating in those dry stacked stones . I had to try and do a painting of it.

It has been said that dry stone walls create unique microcosms, but what about the macrocosm of the larger surface of country they embrace? The same pattern is there too.The network of stone shapes within any well-built wall, and the patterns these walls create in the larger context, as they outline field and pasture throughout the British countryside, have a distinct self similarity. And why is it ,when looking down from above, there is such a similar beauty contained in these patchworks of colours and lines? Why is the cellular tidiness that these walls create so pleasing to look at from any distance? Are we unconsciously making an association - intuitively seeing some deeper significance? Is there a fractal equation perhaps that prescribes the order we are seeing ?

Let's look more closely.

The plural of sheep is sheep

2012-01-04T01:23:00.000-05:00

This is 'fractal-like' definition contained within our vocabulary. Here is a photoshopped visual of that same fractal concept.

A fractal is an object or quantity that displays 'self-similarity'. When you look closer at a single subject you see that its made up of plurals of the same configuration.

In a somewhat technical sense this happens on all scales and on all levels of our existence. The object need not exhibit exactly the same structure at any level of magnification, but the same "type" of structures must appear on all scales.

Basically, a fractal is any pattern that reveals greater complexity as it is enlarged. Thus, fractals graphically portray the notion of 'worlds within worlds' which has obsessed Western culture from its tenth-century beginnings.

Tomorrow let's look at dry stone walls as exhibiting some of these obvious fractal properties.

Rock Paper Scissors

2012-01-03T01:33:00.000-05:00

The photo of these boulders reminds me of the classic children's game Rock Paper Scissors and the three part relationship of creativity (expressed through thinking with our hands).

Let's consider the game in the case of those of us who work with stone.

-What is it are we have chosen to be creative on/with ? Rocks. We need them.

-Paper ? - it is the outstretched fingers of our HANDs. That's us. What we bring to to the rocks. Our knowledge, our skill, our enthusiasm. Farley Mowat shared something about this once. He said "While we get something mysterious from the rocks, we give something back to them too."

-The Tools - are what we use to fashion the material - it may not be SCISSORS- but it could be a hammer, a pneumatic chisel, a saw , maybe just a long pry bar or whatever we use to be creative.

For there to be creativity there has to be other things come into play too - synchronization, freewill, timing and spontaneity. The rules are simple and allow for an orderly progression to determine a undisputed result.

For the game to be rewarding and make any sense these elements Rocks Hands and Tools alternate dominance over one another.

When the three are combined in the right proportions something of significance is left behind for others to be inspired by.

Christmas is over

2012-01-02T01:22:00.000-05:00

Christmas 2011

It's always sad when it comes time to toss the dry stone tree out.

Jan 2 2012

Up and over the wall.

2012-01-01T01:30:00.000-05:00

The new year 2012 presents us with all sorts of opportunities and new walling possibilities.
As we rise to the occasion, we leave the old year in the shadow of our soaring excitement.
The grass may not necessarily be greener, but without fences and all those wonderful dry stone walls, it wouldn't even appear to be 'greener' on the other side of the wall or the calendar.

Thank you to those who I have met or have written me to say you enjoy reading 'Thinking With My Hands'. Thanks especially for all your comments. It's been a great two years of daily blogging now.

I find it is more important than ever to look upward and forward and continue to keep everything in perspective.

Stay tuned for another year of visual surprises and off the wall thoughts on walling.

Venus Gate In December

2011-12-31T01:30:00.000-05:00

I just found this photo taken this week by Louise Knight-Warn of the Venus Gate we built at Hart House Farm during our 2011 Festival of Stone. I thought it was worth sharing here. I like to think of this shot as representing a wonderful year of great accomplishments here in Canada in the realm of dry stone walling. The festival was certainly the crowning achievement but there were other memorable events and projects throughout the year.

As I look at this dry stone entrance way lit up festively in green and red lights I peer on through the opening into the darkness. I realize the future, though unknown, has a lot of direction to it already. The momentum is there. I know everyone who got involved with dry stone walling across Canada this year is looking forward to what we've got planned for the new year. It looks like there will be a number of interesting walling collaborations, including some free walling events, new workshops, a walling tour of Mallorca and plans in the works for our upcoming 2012 festival to be held near Ottawa.

One thing I have realized however is that it's better not to post (boast?) about things that haven't happened yet and indeed might not materialize at all. This arch way, this 'opening' of the present is certainly enough to celebrate. Our past achievements as an organization have encompassed much of the resurgence in dry stone walling here in Canada. Through this beautiful 'gate' there may well be a universe of possibilities but shining here in the dark it represents a testament to nine years of skilled collaboration and well channelled enthusiasm amongst wallers throughout Canada. This structure is a guide post, even in a wintry storm. It provides a realistic reference point to proceed from.

Stones are always in season.

2011-12-30T01:30:00.000-05:00

Stones are always ready for us to be creative with.

Stones just want to be used.

You get the sense that the material is constantly looking for some way to be put together.

You could say that they are always in season.

Whereas pumpkins are only in season for a little while each year. They can only to be built with after they've matured and before they start to rot. You can't build pumpkin walls the whole year round.

Unlike pumpkins, potatoes or squash, stones are a fruit that is always in season.

They continuously offer us the possibility of taking part in the 'creative inevitable'.

The creative act.

2011-12-29T01:30:00.000-05:00

Being creative is the highest form of human fulfillment. It beats any other kind of 're'creation. It is the opposite of so much of what we do, ie. wrecking creation. Some would argue that it is more important than 'pro'creation.

The creative act is vital. Other activities and endeavors can not achieve the same level of satisfaction. No amount shopping, education, entertainment, competitiveness, or commitment to selflessness or selfishness will secure the sense of pleasure and purpose that comes with being involved in a creative act, no matter how brief.

We are all supposed to be creative. It is our function.

There are many ways to be creative, but stone alone provides the rawest potential for human beings to explore.

Stone exists in abundance as the silent, unformed, motionless protagonist ever able to unleash that inner artist in many of us.

There is bond between us and stones. They are more animate than we think. We have more of an affinity with them than they openly acknowledge.

When we come to a stone we must see it as more than a blank canvas to create on. The very mass of stone contains within it an endless source of possibilities to build on or with.

Stones are the basic building blocks for our creative survival.

A little frost and the little glued stone wall is destroyed

2011-12-28T01:30:00.000-05:00

Well the industrial glue gun didn't do the job very well. The tiny stone wall that I'd stuck together (see It's a small wall after all. ) was left outside over night and the thing literally blew apart, affected I presume by the little bit of frost we had on Christmas eve. If it had been just a 'dry' stone miniature wall I had fashioned (of small stones fitted in place) it probably would have stayed together better. Because I depended on the glue to keep the stones in place instead of relying on fitting them so they stayed on their own, then as soon as the glue released, the wall fell apart.

It's a small wall after all.

2011-12-27T01:30:00.000-05:00

I was making Christmas presents for friends and family last week. I figure, what better gift can you give someone than something that you've made yourself? Moreover, what says 'I love you' more than a dry stone wall? Hence, I have ventured into building miniature dry stone walls again. This time I have a heavy duty dry stone wall glue gun, not just an amateur 'unofficial' one!

The tiny stones I collected over the past few years were fragments painstakingly gathered from the ground at various walling sites I've worked at where life-size stones were being shaped. These shards are proving to be perfect for doing some nice delicate free-standing walls.

There are a lot of similarities between building walls on a miniature scale and full scale versions, but obviously there are some very striking differences as well.

Tiny stones, while weighing proportionately less than big ones, seem to lose that all important gripping aspect more exponentially. Stones carefully balanced and even well fitted together have surprisingly little locking power. One might be tempted to think smaller stones could still be configured to hold together as wells as ones in real dry stone walls do regardless of their difference in weight. Not so. In fact, building anything structural becomes very difficult.

Let's consider how this translates if were are building a real wall. While it is tempting to think it would be a lot easier to build any wall if stones in general didn't weigh as much as they do, in real life, it turns out if they were lighter it would be almost impossible. They would never bond properly. While most stones have basically three main properties, weight, hardness and roughness - it becomes strikingly obvious in wall building ( on any scale ) that 'heaviness' is an extremely important factor.

Next week, let's consider other aspects of mini walling such as hearting, batter, types of tools needed and material/site accessibility. Another question worth exploring is - what helps make a miniature wall look convincingly realistic? Things like - keeping your finger out of the picture.

So this is Christmas

2011-12-25T01:30:00.000-05:00

Dry Stone Christmas Music

2011-12-24T01:30:00.000-05:00

What better way to 'rock the night away' this Christmas Eve than by getting together with friendly wallers and singing along with these remastercrafted hits from the past

This special 2011 dry stone compilation includes three Bonus Songs to complete your walling collective.

-I saw scree chips go sailing by

-Dyke the walls

-It's beginning to be a rock-like Christmas

( Readers might like to suggest other song titles to include in next year's Christmas Cd )

Stone-ifferous trees.

2011-12-23T01:30:00.000-05:00

Over the years I've had an opportunity to do a number of Stone-ifferous Trees.

I thought it would be nice to see a few of them again this Christmas season.

A Wreath of Stones

2011-12-22T01:30:00.000-05:00

Wreaths, stone circles and sheepfolds. What do they have in common? This holiday season, if there is a 'holy-day' presence to be discovered, I would suggest that is all wrapped up in 'rings'.

Consider the circular configuration known as Stonehenge. Overlooking the Plains of Salisbury like some monumental ornament, on this day the huge stones align our attention to the moment of the earth's orbit when the sun reaches the critical angle marking the winter solstice.

For years it has stood there as a reminder of the cycle of life, and a signal to the start of each new year. The standing stones of many other ancient circular structures have the same function. Their 'rings' tell a timeless story. We earth dwellers come and go. Those of us going round on this tiny globe realize once more the timeless potential for love, hope and peace, as we align ourselves with that story.

Is it that strange that these stone circles have such a 'ring of truth' about them? Do they not all echo the same circular shaped message of unity and completion? Gradually the megalithic theme is developed through other configurations as it echos down through history in a variety of circular reminders . Our lives are encircled by wreaths signalling the celebration of life and creativity. Like children around the maypole, all our lives move in circles - family circles - social circles - musical, dancing, festive circles - calendar cycles - decorative, spiraling motifs, every one of them. All of this is alluded to in the ornamental loops of Christmas garlands and balls we decorate with.

From before birth, to our departure from this mortal coil, we are enclosed in a protective circle.

Here we are, metaphorically speaking, huddled in a circle around the camp fire, drawing circles in the dirt with our sticks and making glowing circles in the night sky with our fiery brands. We look up to see the familiar round shapes of the moon (and the sun) as they cross the vault of heaven, and we celebrate the circle.

As in olden times, and still to this day, Shepherds enclose their flock within round walls of stone to protect them from harm each night. As one approaches such an enclosure of stones, stacked in a free-standing circular configuration, there is, for those who enter in, a reaffirming sense of place and purpose amidst the wreath of stones.

Corbelling Arches and Bridges in Irelend

2011-12-21T01:30:00.000-05:00

In response to a comment John Scott made on a post I wrote last week concerning Arch Chronology, Patrick McAfee went on to add some other very interesting comments.

"I'd like to mention that we love to corbel here in Ireland and had done so for about 6,000 years when eventually we began to shape the underside of lintels to look like arches. We were happy enough with this until one day quite unexpectedly we were struck by the arrival of the real arch. Although this magically worked only in compression it was a bit too far for us because we were hung up on creating tension. It took many years for us to succumb to the show-off easy ways of compression. But every so often, quite unexpectedly, there is an outbreak of corbelling, I've done it myself, even on your continent. I cant help it, it's a neolithic gene thing.

.... I'd like to add a lesser known fact (probably only of interest to myself) to do with corbelling. It is to be found on some medieval (say 15th century) stone bridges here. They are arched, (pointed or slightly pointed is common) but from the springing stone up say a quarter to one third the rise of the arch the voussoirs are corbelled and not radiated towards centre points. Above that they are are radiated. I have not come across a good reason for it yet but it's common enough and must have had a purpose. "

Does anyone have any thoughts about this?

Stone Arches

2011-12-20T01:30:00.000-05:00

Arch video

An Arch Never Sleeps. Part 2

2011-12-19T01:30:00.000-05:00

A gothic arch was built next, arevolutionary shape in its efficiency, following more closely the catenaryshape of the invisible force of gravity. The gothic arch changed everything,walls became thinner and opened up allowing light more light in. The audiencewere advised to go to Christchurch Cathedral in Dublin and see how in the 12thcentury they started to build Romanesque with semi-circular arches but thenduring the course of the building changed to the pointed gothic arch.

Since Roman times lime mortar was very much apart of arch building and is one reason why so many arches still survive. Why?because lime allows movement; the arch barrel of the bridge moves with traffic and expands and contracts withchanges in temperature but these movements mostly occur in the lime mortarjoints and not in the stones themselves otherwise they would crack and fail.
Nexta segmental arch was built in brick and lime mortar. This is another commonarch but it often hides away where we cannot see it behind plasters and rendersrelieving or taking the weight that would otherwise be applied to the timberlintel underneath.

Lastly a single light round headed windowwas built with a cill, two sides and a lintel having a semi-circular arch shapecut in it. Not an arch at all but simply an arch shape, beautiful and commonlyseen in Irish medieval architecture. Finally the lintel was swapped for an ogeearch shaped lintel to reflect an arch shape common in the 15th and 16thcenturies.

If the world was abandoned for a millenniumI doubt we would find many surviving examples of modern buildings, the steelwould have rusted and destroyed the concrete and anyway very few buildingstoday are designed to last much more than half a century. Amongst the thickundergrowth stone and lime mortar structures would be found that are historiceven in today’s terms and a prominent feature of those structures would be thearch, still working, dutiful, tired but never once in a thousand years havingfallen asleep.

An Arch Never Sleeps Part 1

2011-12-18T01:30:00.000-05:00

An article sent to me by my good friend Patrick McAfee (shown here in the photo)

Building Limes Forum Ireland (BLFI) inconjunction with Drimnagh Castle, Dublin ran a Heritage Week event over thecourse of three mornings in August called ‘An Arch Never Sleeps’. The aim wasto introduce the general public to the wonderful world of arches having a brieflook at their history and then to experience in practice how they were built.

If children were to assist in the buildingprocess then the arches or the separate stones (voussoirs) in the arches had tobe light in weight. It was either buildmini-arches using stone or use a lightweight material and build full scale.Quinnlite blocks were selected; these are lightweight and easily cut to shapeusing traditional stonecutting tools.

The expression ‘an arch never sleeps’ isattributed to the Arab world and beautifully sums up what an arch does, itsafely transfers its own weight and applied forces down its sides, it is therefore‘alive’ dynamic, relentlessly working.

Facing each days audience were the manyarch shapes of Drimnagh Castle itself. As one member of the audience said ‘Itis only when you really look that you see arches everywhere’, this is equallytrue of our cities, towns and villages.

The limitations of the beam was explainedand demonstrated by Lisa Edden, a structural engineer and member of BLFI. Theproblem with the stone lintel Lisa explained is that it is weak in tension. Themagic of the arch is that it eliminates this weakness, it has no tension, justcompression and this is where stone is at its strongest. Further explanation ofhow forces run down an arch was explained by holding a rope between her twohands forming an inverted curve called a catenary arch displaying the shape ofthese forces.

Pat McAfee, stonemason and also a member ofBLFI started with the building of a semi-circular arch. The semi-circular archwas beloved of the Romans and used extensively by them throughout their empire.It has been popular here in Ireland from at least the Romanesque period ofarchitecture.

Each day a young volunteer/s from theaudience came forward to assist with building the arches. When the final stoneof each arch (keystone) was laid and the timber centre removed the arch camealive, it was as if suddenly something magic had occurred and it had, not onlyin the eyes of the young helpers but also amongst the adults in the audience.Something taken for granted and not thought about until now became something tothink and marvel about. The response from the audience was always the same,spontaneous applause, with the young helper/s taking a bow.

(part two tomorrow)

Coral Christmas

2011-12-17T01:30:00.000-05:00

The coral wreath post today has absolutely nothing to do with dry stone walling, but interestingly enough I've discovered they do build walls out of coral in several parts of the world.

My friend Mikelos came back from Bermuda and showed me some photos he took of some very cool dry coral walls there. Apparently they are everywhere. They don't use stone at all to build walls. There isn't enough stone but there is so much coral there and it seems to be just as durable and shapable as stone.

Wouldn't it be nice to go on a trip and see coral walls like these somewhere - maybe go this time of year and experience a balmy Christmas in Bermuda perhaps?

The Advent of the Arch.

2011-12-16T01:30:00.001-05:00

A long time ago when people first started stacking stones to make buildings, rather than just find caves to live in, it would have seemed logical that doors could be created by merely erecting stone pillars (or making openings between walls) for lintels to be lifted up onto. (the first example on left)

Corbelling over, or stepping over, one stone at a time to cover an opening may have been the next development.

Then there was the advent of the arch.

One would have thought that the 'pointed opening' would have come along first as a kind of natural progression. The pillars for an opening may have been built with a lean on purpose (or more likely inadvertently) and then the conclusion that butting them up against each other to support each other to form an opening beneath the two columns, (the second example from the left) would have seemed like a logical way to make a door. It was very structural.

A variation of this, (the middle example) where the individual stones of the two pillars angle in slightly but still come to a point, creates a wider very adequate pointed arch, later to become the Gothic arch opening. This would have no tendency to separate or slip downwards. Supporting stones over the opening would be fairly simple.

There is now a very difficult leap of the imagination in the development and design of the arch to have the insight to balance stones in an 'arc' to form a rounded or Roman arch (the two examples on the right)

This would have required more than leaning pillars. It would need more than tapered stones. The concept would be revolutionary and it would need someone to come up with the idea of a form to support the weight of the many stones which would have to 'hang' in the air until the thing was built. When it was completed the pillars would tend to separate and the stones would start to slip straight down if there wasn't proper side support. This was a lot of extra work to straddle essentially the same width opening as the Gothic arch.

This kind of rounded arch would have been a big departure from the pointed or leaning arch. It would have been developed many years after the pointed arch.

But it wasn't . The Roman Arch came many many years before the pointed arch!

BEETLEMASONRY Remastered Rock Rolling

2011-12-15T01:30:00.000-05:00

Photo by Brad Bolton 1995

Thanks to Nancy Wesser for sending this amazing photo yesterday of a stone clad Volkswagen Beetle .

When I enquired to know more about it, Nancy sent this from her brother.

"The whole episode of the construction of the Stone VW is revealed by the owner in a book titled simply "My Bug". The editor, Michael J. Rosen, has collected the stories of dozens of VW owners. Stephen Gibian was the builder and the year was 1976. There was a rusted hulk of a 60's Beetle in the field and, nearby, the remains of a stone foundation. Put them together, and...voila! The book has additional photos of the construction stages as well as descriptive text, e.g.: "The windows were slabs of stone found at a local quarry..."

You can find the book at Amazon.Com. The other stories contain lots of memories of Beetles long-gone, but it's worth getting just for the Stone VW story.

The book is ISBN 1-57965-135-6"

Trying to understand the point.

2011-12-14T01:30:00.000-05:00

Everyone knows what a Gothic arch looks like. It is an arch with a point. There are many variations on the pointed arch theme. There are formulas as to how to make these arches, all with various shapes and names including Lancet, Equilateral, Ogee and Reverse Ogee Arches. The point is they are not rounded at the top.

The Gothic arch came about after the Roman arch in about 1120. It has two advantages; in that a Gothic arch reaches higher for a given width and it will produce only half the side-thrust of a similar Roman arch . A major consideration when building a masonry arch is the amount of horizontal thrust that it produces on its foundations. Masonry walls can easily absorb large vertical compressive forces. A Gothic arch sends the force downward more vertically.

Where the Gothic arch came from is another question. It is often described as an invention of medieval French masons, as if was just dreamed up from nowhere. Some people say the pointed arch was a graft on the Romanesque, Lombard, and Byzantine architecture of Europe. It's interesting to note however that the pointed vault was developed in Persia many years before. The actual first appearance of the pointed arch in the Muslim World has been traced to the Al-Aqsa Mosque built in the late 700's . Some scholars think it was this mosque that inspired the Crusaders to imitate the Muslim pointed arch in Europe.

No matter where it came from, the crazy thing is that the Gothic arch came after the Roman arch. In a later blog I'll explain why I think this is so strange.

Celebrate while you can.

2011-12-13T01:30:00.000-05:00

Let's all 'lighten up' this Holiday Season and do some festive Christmas Stacking around the house, with real stones, before the forces of darkness make it illegal to decorate with anything except plastic.

2011-12-12T01:30:00.000-05:00

Sometimes we can't see the wall for the stones.

Arch Chronology

2011-12-11T01:30:00.000-05:00

I always thought that the Romans invented the arch. I was wrong.

Some time before the Romans, the first true arch was discovered, or should we say invented. The arch proved to be a huge quantum leap over the earlier post and lintel approach to spanning openings. The corbel vault with a similar arc shape and principle, but quite different from the proper fanned arch, was perhaps an intermediate step. The challenges of corbelling over wider and wider openings may have led to the discovery of the arch. No matter how it happened who ever came up with the first arch changed the course of architectural history.

Contrary to what people think however, it wasn't the Romans who discovered it. Examples and evidence of arch structures have been found in earlier civilizations, beginning with the Mesopotamians. The Egyptians also constructed arch vaults to roof the tombs they built. Then there were the Greeks who utilized the arch idea now and then but only in very simple structural applications.

It was not until the Etruscans came along that the arch became a practical element in some of their early 'monumental' architecture. One example is the Porta Augusta, where the idea of the arch was refined and merged with Greek elements.

The Romans took this knowledge and developed it further and did some amazing things with it. They invented the idea of setting an arch on top of columns or abutments to span wide walkways and decorative entrance openings. They showed off and used it brilliantly in a number of their buildings. The Romans developed the arch also to be used for the very practical purpose of building bridges and aqueducts.

Pont du Gard in France built by the Romans

Some Pre-Christmas Stacking Thoughts

2011-12-10T01:30:00.000-05:00

Think how many more books we could stack in a room if we didn't store them on shelves.

Think about all the weird ways people would stack computers for, if they weren't monitored

Think of the varied compositions we could leave bags stacked in, if the fall didn't happen so fast .

Stack of leaves installation and photo by John Scott
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Please send in any of your cool 'stacking-filler' pics to john@dswac.ca

Slater's Bridge in Flood

2011-12-09T01:30:00.000-05:00

Gavin Rose sent me some great pics yesterday of Slater's Bridge being besieged by recent flood waters. The Lake District where he works as a trail builder has received lots of rain this season.

The old dry stone bridge is still keeping those who cross it dry. Gavin writes "Its amazing to think that this structure has stood up to that amount of punishment for centuries and certainly testiment to the durability of drystone arch bridges in general."

Check my previous blog entry to see what it normally looks like. Happy Bridge Day

Dun Aonghasa

2011-12-08T01:30:00.000-05:00

The majority of the dry laid stonework at the ancient fort known as Dun Aonghasa on the Aran Island of Inishmore is amazing and intriguing. At first glance it looks too random and almost ugly.

As I stand there, with a cold brisk wind from the west nearly pushing me over, I'm looking at the magnificent arrangement of stones and finding it very hard to understand the pattern. I take a picture and tell myself I will study it closer when I get back to Canada.

The wall stones are chunky squares arranged in an almost vertical pattern. The smaller stones create a network of snecks beside many of these larger rectangles.

These are impressively high walls that have stood the test of time yet they seem so primitively constructed with no purposed attention to coursing or conventional bonding.

What can we learn from this wall? What are the stones saying?

Walk the Walk

2011-12-07T01:30:00.000-05:00

Photo by Tomas Lipps

Walk the Walls Tour

March 25-April 02 2012

The Balearic Islands-Mallorca and Menorca-Spain

Join John Shaw-Rimmington and Ireland's Patrick McAfee for our second annual D.S.W.C.A. walking tour - this time to the Balearic Islands of Mallorca and Menorca, Spain.

Our trip to Mallorca and Menorca will catch the majestic Tramuntana mountains in full spring bloom and we will stay away from the overdeveloped coastal resorts to discover the other world of Mallorca seldom seen by tourists. We will follow the Ruta de Pedra en Sec, the dry stone way (approx. 300k.), the old cobbled paths and ancient bridle ways of the northwestern massif of limestone, that tumbles down to the turquoise waters of the Mediterranean Sea. We will walk this magnificent landscape of valleys and cascading streams through citrus groves, olive terraces and forests of Holm oak. Along these paths that once linked Mallorca's isolated villages, we pass dry stone huts, threshing circles, walls, lime kilns, byres, stiles and bread ovens.

Tentatively we will stay at an "agrotourism" finca, an old farm home/hotel, and at a 17th Century monastery at Lluc, that boasts a choral group singing each evening, and the song of a nightingale to lull us to sleep.

We will hike the " Pilgrims Way", the "Archduke's Walk" -- all traditional wall walks and visit a "marger school" for stone wall construction.

The second half of the tour we will spend in Menorca, a UNESCO designated Biosphere Reserve known for its collection of megalithic stone monuments dating from the second millennium, B.C. Menorca is a less developed and a more pastoral landscape than Mallorca. In every field on the island, thousands of metres of dry stone walls protect the topsoil from eroding, shelter the olive tree roots and keep livestock from the strong Tramuntana winds.

Absorb yourself in the Mediterranean landscape, home to vultures, ferrets and 100 species of plants...enjoy the music, the food and the traditions of the region. John Shaw-Rimmington and Patrick McAfee are familiar with the islands and will share their knowledge and experiences with us.The Walk the Walls portion of the tour and the flight portion are priced separately so those wishing to make their own travel plans to and from our destination may do so. Debbie at the Travel Broker can help you with your plans. We are designing this tour for the hikers, walkers or wanderers. Our itinerary will be as casual as possible.Our goal is to introduce the culture, the history, the ecology and for many, to connect with the stones of our past!Costs and Dates:

Mallorca and Menorca, Spain-March 25-April 02 . Cost $ 2589.00 taxes included. (based on double occupancy) Flight from Toronto to Palma return approx.

$1,300.00 dependent on booking time. (Please note: if you choose to travel with our group from Toronto we will depart the evening of March 24 arriving in Spain on March 25, depart Spain April 03, arrive Canada April 03)

Space is limited, please book a.s.a.p.
For travel information please contact Debbie Lloyd CTC, The Travel Broker, atdeblloyd@the travelbroker.ca or 613 389 7914 or 888 830 5324. For general tour information contact:
Margot Miller, <margotm@1000island.net>or 613 659 3415 or <http://www.dswac.ca>

Outlasting qualities.

2011-12-06T01:30:00.000-05:00

Here is another wall. It doesn't matter who built it or where it is. I will resort to a quote from the friend who sent the photo to me to describe it. "The stone is not very nice looking to work with, but the build quality manages to be worse."

The fact is, this structure is now preserved in stone, because it is made of stone. It will probably last much longer that the wooden porch (with bell-cast roof ) which I built on the front of our house, that is, if I don't replace the shingles in 20 years, paint it now and then and maintain the wooden deck.

Lasting ugliness

2011-12-05T01:30:00.000-05:00

A bad looking dry stone wall can still last for years, because it's built of stone.

Is the fact that it probably can last the only criteria then for not insisting on building a more aesthetic looking dry stone wall?

Objectives without objections

2011-12-04T01:30:00.000-05:00

Yesterday sixteen people assembled upstairs at Highway 61 Barbeque Restaurant in Toronto to discuss the direction of organized dry stone walling in Canada. Enthusiasts and professionals alike gathered at the request of our DSWAC integrated resources consultant Evan Oxland to hear what Dean Mclellan had to say about becoming a not for profit organization.

We were encouraged to link ourselves as closely as possible with the DSWA in Great Britain and adopt their well tested certification scheme and uphold their rigorous standards as a model of Canadian walling. Discussion was lively and a board of five members were chosen to discuss and agree upon the objectives of such an organization for all members to then approve in order to proceed to the next stage of legal incorporation.

Dr Carlan Stants was asked to chair the meeting and did a fine job. Jo Hodgson and he drove all the way from Quebec to attend this important meeting. Everyone felt that this was a successful step to a new phase of the development of the association and agreed to meet together again soon.

An opening

2011-12-03T02:26:00.001-05:00

A door through a dry stone wall.

When you come up against a stone wall, you don't have to give up.

If it is a dry stone wall you can always make a door and go through it.

If there is someone on the other side helping to make that opening, there is a collaboration.

An opening, unlike a collaboration, gets bigger the more you take away from it.

But both get easier as they get bigger.

It may take time to move all the rocks and you will need to watch out you don't drop any on the one you are collaborating with,

but in the end a 'way' can be made.

And the wall will not been be destroyed. In fact, it will be improved.

Regrouping

2011-12-02T01:30:00.000-05:00

There is a difference in just "taking up the space" and actually "packing the space" between all the stones inside a dry stone wall. The distinction is quite important. Perhaps a way to better understand this is to consider the analogy of packing a van on moving day. If we are careful, and fit things closely together, it is possible to move all of the furniture we have in just one truck load. If we are rushed or not paying attention to how things can fit together, our truck may only be able to hold half the things we want to take with us.

Building a wall is an exercise in regrouping . The mass of stones which have been randomly gathered or dumped in a pile onto our property are going to be regrouped into a much smaller space. There is something inherently pleasing about this undertaking. Regrouping stones can often become a visual or physical equivalent to regrouping mentally or emotionally. We are taking the time to turn the seemingly random aspects of our lives into some well organized structural pattern. Regrouping is a fundamental part of our sense of well being and contentment. If we can watch what we are doing during wall building we can better understand what regrouping involves in the more complex and abstract applications of daily life.

First off, we are not just piling stones together. Stones plopped together or even placed next to, and onto, one another do not make for a properly built wall. All the stones in the middle of the wall, and many of these are the smallest ones, need to all be fitted and packed adjacent to one another in such a way as to densely reinforce the space between larger 'building stones'. Ideally there should be little or no space between any stones (big or small) in our wall. This is done primarily so that the wall will last a long time without falling down. We are looking especially for the places (gaps) that occur under the stones that we have placed in our wall, where a similar shaped hearting piece can fit and eliminate the possibility of those stones slipping or slumping. The more exactly the space is filled the better the structure. Placing one uniquely shaped stone to fill a specific gap instead of having two stones placed to fit the same cavity, is a far better solution. Small wedge shaped stones particularly fit and tighten up better into all those V shaped gaps that commonly occur between the stones we are building with, whether they are roundish stones or flat ones.

Packing is an art. In the process of building a wall we are refining our skills and getting better and better at this craft of fitting shapes together. Much of the art of the wall will be unseen within the wall, much of the complexity will go undiscovered, and much of how we build the wall will be a mystery to those who come along after to see the finished masterpiece. The creative process has been primarily one of seeing how that which seems infinite can be squeezed into a section of the finite, thus recapturing a sense of simple wonder and ordered beauty. What we are doing too is like an intricate mosaic. It takes time and patience. We should be trying to get the pieces to fit more an more like inlaid wood or marble rather than dropping chunks of kindling into a firewood box. In any case what we are doing is definitely not like shoveling gravel into a hole.

It would be enough to concede that carefully fitted and stacked stones make the best walls; that this activity of regrouping stones is actually enjoyable and therapeutic in itself, says a lot about who we are as humans. We are a species of regroupers. Is this concept so strange? I think not. If nothing else it is just giving a broader meaning to a rather quaint term used to describe early man. We, dry stone wallers, are the new hunter/ gatherers, densely gathering and compacting the stone shapes we have been hunting for. We are those who see the need to stop and regroup. All the piles of aggregated confusion around us may not be as big as we think. Anyway, let's take the time to sort things out. Letting the dust settle is just the beginning; next we have to gather it up and pack it and build with it again.

Come on then, let's regroup.

Another look at Wade's memorial cairn

2011-12-01T01:30:00.000-05:00

Another look at the dry stone memorial built in Canada recently by John Scott of Algonquin College Heritage Masonry School. It looks rather stately perched there on the solid rock of this exposed part of the Canadian shield. The stone structure stands as a peaceful reminder to John and many of Wade's friends and family, that he was very happy here. Stones shaped and set carefully in piles at some isolated place like this one can express the inexpressible.

The Shim

2011-11-30T01:30:00.000-05:00

Photo by SEan Adcock

In rock balancing, there seems to be an unspoken shunning of shims. Stones stacked in a clever balanced column look more impressive if there is no evidence of tiny stones wedged here and there to keep the thing from falling over.

So too in a dry stone wall if one sees a lot of shims, there is a feeling that the wall is inferior. It's not just that the bigger stones look like they are not fitted properly - the whole wall generally looks too busy. The logical reason for our prejudice about visible shims is that they look like they could easily fall out in time or dislodge with the movement of the frost, and then the whole wall would begin to fall apart.

Inside the wall is a different matter. Shims placed strategically within the network of 'builder stones' are recognized to be invaluable. Here they can be wedged and pinned to increase the point of contact between stones without risk of falling out and more importantly they can align stones along the plane of the wall and keep them from slipping in too.

The hidden shim is a humble, modest, adaptable, yet worthy leveler and supporter of any particular area in the wall it is assigned to. Tapered, almost weightless in comparison to the rock it supports, the shim enables a magical adhesion between even unfriendly shapes.

While a shim is both unassuming and unseen, it is interesting to note that, according to one dictionary, the antonym of the word shim, is 'emptiness'.

I enjoy the idea of the shim being one of the most important 'jam packing' parts of my world and my work.

On occasion.

2011-11-29T01:30:00.000-05:00

I am soberly coming to the realization that doing the right thing and dealing with some of the misconceptions that prevail in the small world of dry stone walling here in Canada will not make a shred of difference to the outcome of a situation if the people who don't know the whole story have already been primed to think you are the bad guy.

I say this with a degree of pessimism yes, but a kind of freeing insight as to how to go on and not be eaten up by injustices perpetrated by people who must have been on occasion presented with the choice to behave and think otherwise.

I have posted things on this web site that are, to the best of my ability, the truth about walls and walling. On occasion a few of the posts have been about someone or other who has continuously invested their time saying untrue things about other wallers behind their backs. By contrast, when I write about this problem, I write in public not covertly, and try to make sense of it all in kind of dry stone parables. It should be noted that the person(s) in question were never named or referred to specifically in any posts. Happily their shady antics were usually the stepping stone to some better insight into the way things fit or don't fit together in a dry stone wall.

That others recognized the unsavoury characteristics of the unnamed individuals I wrote about and that the key people even saw themselves, confirms that I have to some extent described them accurately. I take no great delight in exposing them to others but rather hope that their recognition of themselves might be enough to encourage them to seek an amicable resolution with those they find fault with, rather than continue to take delight in conflict.

Igloos without glue

2011-11-28T01:30:00.000-05:00

How to Build an Igloo - National Film Board of Canada

Even if you have seen it before ( possibly back in grade school) this National Film Board documentary is worth watching on youtube again. It illustrates the indigenous people, working in artic Canada with natural local material, building a useful shelter by shaping and fitting blocks of snow together without relying on a lot of rules or regulations, nor using fancy implements beyond an ivory knife.

It is fascinating to see how they do it. The domed dry snow house requires a working knowledge of simple structural principles and a determination to build something that will do the job with very little fuss. These houses may not pass any buiding codes nor last beyond one winter's harshness; yet the builders are skilled people who have mastered a way of building perfectly good shelters, engineered with an understanding of the land on which they build and the materials that they availed themselves of.

Poor walls without borders

2011-11-27T01:30:00.000-05:00

© Copyright Jim Champion and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence

This photo of a wall in Britain shows what happens to a dry stone wall anywhere when it's not built very well..

What would Andy do?

2011-11-26T01:30:00.000-05:00

I proposed an idea on a stone forum a while back which involved an activity/discussion called, 'What would Andy do?'

The rules were really simple.

We each in turn posted a scene of stockpiled material, plant forms, tool groupings, or repeated landscape elements or whatever, and then people were invited to comment and propose creative ideas (inspired by each picture) as to what you could make with the things in the photo. Solutions, artistic applications, whimsical constructions, even improvements were all encouraged. The person with the best idea got to post the next picture.

I kicked off the game with this photo I took in the Lake District two years ago.

It seems to me we have the three basic building groups here. One is a man made material which though very structural is going to be hard to use in a creative way.

The second is a naturally grown material ( I think the English call them swedes and the Swedish call them kålrots, although in all fairness they should have named them Brits) Though these vegetables are more of body building material and are supposed to be eaten, they might inspire some other use. Certainly anyone who hated them as a kid might have found a way to get rid of them off their plate

And then third, in the background there is a neatly piled assortment of random stones which apart from making walls can be used in an infinite number of creative ways.

I'd like to see if someone could come up with an idea describing how Andy might use any or all three in an artistic installation

More photos of dry stone kayak storage structure.

2011-11-25T01:30:00.000-05:00

I posted photos of the beginning of this project back on November 17th. I noticed someone commented immediately afterwards requesting to see more pictures of the structure. Here are pics of the progress on the dry stone chamber up to Tuesday this week. The wrought iron arch door is a nice touch, don't you think? The pintels which act as pivots for the door to hinge on are buried deep into the sides of the arch opening. The form is in place and held up with eight two by fours. The stone voussoirs around the door will sit slightly above the frame of the door so that they are supporting themselves and not likely to be pushed up by the frame if it is moved independently of the arch.

Movable Fence Post

2011-11-24T01:30:00.000-05:00

The dry stone walls in the area of Glenn Lyon Scotland that Norman has done a lot of work have metal fencing along the top of them. Earlier this month we were happing near Bridge of Balgie. The wire fencing has been added to increase the height of the wall so that the sheep wont be able to get over. The two strands of wire are held by metal posts imbedded into large cope stones at intervals of about 16 feet. The wires run through the posts but are not fastened at the post. When a section of wall has slumped and needs repairing the individual cope stones with posts can be easily lifted and slid along the wire and repositioned temporarily on another section of wall until the repair is done. Then the cope stone is lifted back into position.

Looking back at Rocktoberfest. Part 1

2011-11-23T01:30:00.000-05:00

Photo by SEan Adcock

I keep thinking about the 'Venusgate' we built during Rocktoberfest 2011. It was a terrific accomplishment to complete not just the arch opening part of this unusual dry stone structure, but the freestanding plinth shape too. There was a point where I wondered if we were going to get it all done. The timing was close on the Monday. By mid afternoon some of the volunteers and wallers had to be thinking about packing up to begin their long drive home.
Things came together as if by magic. The curve shape above the arch was something that probably needed to be decided upon earlier and yet we couldn't really until we had laid the diamond shape keystone. The keystone looked like it called for another above it. This meant that the overall height had to be added to. Amazingly what we ended up with was a perfect height and proportion.
The form had to be taken out, the boards taken down, the rocks removed and the area cleared in time to bring in the musicians. The sod had to brought in and laid with barely any time before people began gathering for the concert. The plinth which was only still half built continued to be built while the harpist tuba guitar trio performed. By the time the concert was finished, so too were everyone of the dry stone structures we had come together to build.

Stay stones, stay.

2011-11-22T01:30:00.000-05:00

It's all about getting things to stay

If we know what we are doing and we work hard enough at it we can get almost anything to stay. We have to be patient. We have to love it. We have to have an affinity with our subject. Gravity helps, but it helps to have a sense of humour some times too. It's good to be able to put things in perspective. And treats, when we've done a good job, help too.

On top of things

2011-11-21T01:30:00.000-05:00

The summer 'cairn project' that Eric Landman headed and his assistants Ryan Josh and several wallers from Dry Stone Walling Across Canada helped with, was completed just before Rocktoberfest 2011.
The client asked us if he could use up the tons and tons of leftover material that wasn't used on the long decorative wall that she had someone build for her several year before on her property in Creemore Ontario. It felt good not to waste the stone or have to bury it.
The pattern of laying stone in a random herring bone design was very challenging. The style stones acted as supports for us to continue building higher and higher. Eventually we stood in a front-end-loader bucket to complete the top 5 feet of the cairn. We also built a small secret niche into the structure for storing important artifacts. The chamber was sealed with an inconspicuous stone.

A ranch of the DSWAC

2011-11-20T01:30:00.000-05:00

When I was overseas recently I had a good long talk with a skilled waller who had recently stepped down from a very successful leadership role in an organization that involved people who built with stone. His wife described his day to day job of trying to get everyone on the same page and deal with awkward people and not offend anyone, as being a bit like herding cats.

Fitting stones together in a dry stone wall (herding stones?) though difficult and challenging is so much easier than trying to get people working together amicably. I'm reminded of something Thea Alvin said jokingly at this year's dry stone wall festival. 'C'mon fight nice guys." We all did.

For the most part wallers are a great bunch of people. Like cats, they do like to go their own way and do their own thing. That doesn't need to be a problem. When we do manage to all come together and work as well as we did at that recent DSWAC walling festival at the U of T property near Caledon, then I think it's an indicatation of how healthy an organization we actually have in Canada. While it may be more like a ten thousand acre ranch, it's at least a place where all us cats are free to graze and be safe from cat rustlers.

Coffee Table Book

2011-11-19T01:30:00.000-05:00

Went to a book launch in Port Hope Ontario last night at Furby Books.

Autographed copies of the new coffee table book Private Gardens of the Northumberland Hills were being sold.

I was pleased to see dry stone structures built by Canadian wallers featured in several of the photos of properties that the authors Susan Carmichael,Jacquie Currelly and Peggy Della Rosa chose to showcase

There were several pages showing the work we did north of Colbourg including Cornish Hollow Bridge. Thought for the day - Pictures of dry stone walls make for good coffee table books.

A Memorial Cairn

2011-11-18T01:30:00.000-05:00

John Scott built this granite structure as a kind of dry stone tribute to his best friend Wade who died tragically last April. The memorial cairn which is situated in a very remote area in White Lake (near Arnprior Ontario) is at a place where Wade camped and frequented often. The structure was completed just yesterday

Ten tons of gnarly chunky stone were gathered locally and rolled out of the bush and painstakingly shaped by John with hammer and chisel.The sandstone plaque was brought in his truck from Southern Ontario and the letters were tooled in the evenings at the cabin where John stayed until he finished this lonely and rather noble gesture of remembrance to his well beloved friend.

John told me that just as he was starting a fire at the end of the last day of building a large doe jumped out of the bush and stared at him briefly and then disappeared back into the underbrush.

Our chamber's nearly made

2011-11-17T01:30:00.000-05:00

I have a good friend who asked me to help him this fall with some walling. He needs to extend his driveway along the side of his house. The land drops off to the back so we are terracing it to create a larger flat area at the end of his driveway extending it 12 feet so that he can park his trailer there. In addition to this he is short of storage space and needs to keep his two kayaks out of the weather somewhere.

We decided on the idea of creating a long dry stone chamber under his new extended driveway structure in order to accommodate his two boats. Here are some shots of the progress so far. The wooden form will be put in place sometime soon and the dry stone vault will probably be completed next week. After the area above the vaulted chamber is leveled a thick flat concrete driveway pad will be poured.

Visit back to Rockport

2011-11-16T01:00:00.000-05:00

Stone walling it in Rockport

Revisiting the gap that we repaired

2011-11-15T01:30:00.000-05:00

Last week we returned to do some work in Glenn Lyon and drove by to look at the wall repair we did at the bridge of Balgie back last December. It was still looking good. The Highland cows were hanging out there that day.

All the snow that December made progress slow when we were working on the repair. If you put down your hammer for too long you couldn't find it in the fresh fallen snow. And our gloves got all soggy. And our feet got cold. Wow. Just like Canada.

The tradition of sportsmanship.

2011-11-14T01:35:00.001-05:00

A super bowl. A favourable impression. A 'post ceremony' in stone. This feature was a collaboration of Norman's and mine created in Scotland just a few weeks after many of us came together and celebrated Rocktoberfest in Canada.

Successful festivals of stone depend on a continuity of friendships among the community of wallers here in Canada and abroad. It's never a competition or a showdown.

Those who put aside egos and grievances and work together year after year to help build this legacy in stone, make it possible for those who look on to appreciate the craft as a whole.

Leftovers

2011-11-13T00:00:00.000-05:00

This dry stone tree was built with the kind of small stones that are often left over after a wall is finished. I just added the bigger longer stones to become the branches. Using stones that one has avoided thinking about having to use for the bulk of a larger project requires thinking with your hands.

The hump and the hollow. ( Using leftovers)

2011-11-12T01:30:00.000-05:00

There is often a question as to what to do with leftover stone from a large dry stone walling projects.

Last year Norman and I came up with a solution which involved burying most of the stones in a hump and then covering half of it with turf and exposing the half the pile in a clever dome configuration.

We were going to call it the 'dry stone semi-sphere'

While the client liked this Sketchup design I came up with the idea morphed into a separate hump and an inverse hollow dry stone bowl design.

We dug the hole and buried a lot of the stone and were ready to do the pitching of the bowl shape but then the weather closed in last December in Scotland and it snowed and snowed. I flew back to Canada. And came back out this November .

I was asked to come and finish the project on my visit here this November.

Here is a photo of it the day Norman and I completed it.

Tomorrow I'll there is another 'how-to-use-leftover-stone story' to tell

Frugal or Beautiful?

2011-11-11T01:30:00.000-05:00

Norman Haddow tells the story of a time he had to do an evaluation for the DSWA of two walls built either side of an entrance way by two different wallers, both named Charlie.

The farmer who owned the property came down the lane to talk and when Norman explained what he was doing the farmer asked him which he liked better.
"I like Charlie M's wall." Norman replied.
"Well I prefer Charlie R's wall" said the old farmer, " because he came afterwards and built a perfectly good wall with all the leftover stones that Charlie M. couldn't use."

See if you can decide whose wall this is in the picture?

Pronunciation

2011-11-10T01:30:00.000-05:00

Two old walls at Huntingtower Castle in Perth, Scotland.

One is dry laid.

One isn't.

The one without mortar is more pleasing to look at since the contours are clearly visible and each 'stone' is far more pronounced

By the way here in Scotland, stone is pronounced 'stoow-in'.

Balloons and Bridges

2011-11-09T01:30:00.000-05:00

Balloons and bridges.

Are they so far apart?

Both are solutions.

Both are an implementation of man's ingenuity allowing souls to be carried loftily over the terrain below.

The circuit of stones suspended in air, compacted in a mass of rocks wedged together in a buoyant rising arc pattern above the earth doesn't seem very different from the colourful bubble we see following its arched course gracefully across the sky.

Both celebrate a state of weightlessness.

They both stretch majestically across a span of the firmament –

One in space, over a brief span of time. One, over space, for a longer span of time.

They both begin in a frenzy of activity.

Hammers and chisels and the bustling sounds

of rocks being brought into shape by through various skills.

Ropes and propane tanks and the shouting tugging sounds on the ground

while the balloon slowly fills.

Both sooner or later rise above the clamour of activity that launches them.

And then hang there in the sky

... peaceful and serene.

Rock On and Dream Bigger

2011-11-08T01:30:00.000-05:00

click here > A Blogger's view of Rocktoberfest

Wall or Glyphics?

2011-11-07T01:30:00.000-05:00

Traveling up to Glenn Lyon this week we took a route that passed this rather unusual wall near Kenmore Scotland. It is a wall Norman and I both knew about previously. It's infused with many strange designs and clever patterns which tempt one to think there is some sort of a story here. No one seems to know who built the wall but it is obviously a fairly new one.

Many years from now when fragments of buried Cd's, DVDs and other relics of modern technology are being discovered in isolated parts of the world, a world very different from the one we know today, what will future experts conclude their significance to be? Will any technology still existing at that time able to read the mysterious remnants of our present day civilization? Might archaeologists of the future better understand humanity by decoding simple stacks of stones such as these?

Bridge Sign

2011-11-06T01:30:00.000-04:00

I noticed this bridge sign as Norman Haddow and I were driving up to Glenn Lyon in Scotland. It seemed so simple, so unassuming yet I knew it marked yet another lovely old stone bridge that would have been very interesting to stop and inspect. We passed several such bridges along the way to Bridge of Balgie where we would be staying last week and working nearby repairing an old dry stane dyke.

The best bridge, of course, is this one which is the one that Norman visited with his family on vacation when he was just a little boy and eventually inspired him to build a similar bridge year's later .

While Norman has driven past the Glenn Lyon bridge, (viewing it from the other side of the river many times over the years) during his times working in the glen he had not actually crossed it for 40 years.
Last week after a night of heavy rain and when the burn was high he and I visited it closer. We parked the car down river and actually crossed the river and hiked all the way around to take pictures and walk across it. It was significant moment in time for both of us . Normans bridges in Scotland and my bridges in Canada owe a lot to the Glenn Lyon Bridge.

A.C.R.O.N.Y.M.S.

2011-11-04T01:30:00.000-04:00

People are like stone chisels.
There are 'pitchers' who pitch in whenever they can to help.
There are 'pointers' who help show the way and often forge ahead along challenging new paths.
And then there are 'tracers' who copy everything you do.
Sometimes these chisels are referred to as 'splitters'.

Big Game?

2011-11-03T01:30:00.000-04:00

Bridge-hunter Dan Pearl is laying in wait to get a shot of this arch.
Most of the stones in this bridge were hunted down locally and then 'captured in space' to be suspended continually over a vaulted six foot opening. Dan and six other dry stone wallers from the States and Canada were responsible for 'bagging' this beauty out there in the woods north of Kingston Ontario and then we took our cameras and shot it. No it didn't fall down. We all agreed that the whole experience was far better than going out in the fall and shooting animals.
Think of how different it would be if the North American tradition was that groups of Canadian and American men went out every autumn to stay in walling camps and bond and build stone bridges out in the bush instead of shoot off rifles ?

Thanks Anyway

2011-11-02T01:30:00.000-04:00

If committees told the truth

"Hi, we're here to take your project to places you didn't imagine.

With us on board, your project will now take three times as long.

It will cost five times as much.

And we will compromise the art and the vision out of it, we will make it reasonable and safe and boring."

Great work is never reasonable, safe or boring. Thanks anyway.

Thanks to Seth again.If committees told the truth

International Waller Dave Goulder

2011-11-01T01:30:00.000-04:00

Walling instructor and DSWA Mastercraftsman Dave Goulder, from Rosehall, Scotland, went on from teaching a two day workshop at our Canadian DSWAC 'Roctoberfest' event to join Dan Snow in Vermont and teach another walling workshop and test students there.

The results can be seen on Dan's Blog

DSWA Test Day at the Stone Trust

Scary Stonework

2011-10-31T01:30:00.000-04:00

Just because a dry stone structure looks different, just because it lacks the extra tight coursing of say Yorkshire style walls, or because it's built in the middle of a pumpkin patch or has strange irregular stones protruding from it , holes running through it or maybe untapered stones suspended together in an arch – that doesn't automatically make it 'scary'.

A wall may look like it is falling down too, but that may be because it was built to look that way. Case in point the Gothic Victorian ruins Dan Snow and several others of us in the DSWAC built at Hill and Dale B and B in Canada back in 2005 which had some stones pushing out from a big hole where other stones appeared to be missing in the foundation. It was actually designed to appear like the whole thing was coming apart. To this day if I am showing visitors the folly here in Port Hope I have to tell them not worry about the ruined look of the walls and that it was all planned.

Even if a wall is showing obvious signs of wear and has annoying cracks along it, it's likely that it still has years of life in it. Honestly folks, it isn't that scary. It definitely isn't as scary as concrete (no matter how long it lasts) or cement block work, or mortared stonework that doesn't even trying to look beautiful or aesthetic. It isn't as scary as innocuously bland heaps of institutional masonry built without imagination or any respect for the environment. It isn't as scary a torturous gabion cages or ominous military occupations of armour stone

No 'scary' means badly built to the point where it is embarrassing or dangerous. And while it's scary when people try to do it and yet completely fail in terms of how structural or beautiful dry stone work could have been, it's even more 'scary' when those who know they can do better, only criticise and rarely risk trying anything out of the ordinary or whimsical or even remotely scary themselves.

Now that's scary!

Building Bridges

2011-10-30T01:30:00.000-04:00

Something there is in me that loves a dry stone bridge,
That makes my heart swell as I look under it,
To see the upper boulders suspended in an arc,
To form a weightless path where even two can pass abreast over a gully or creek.
It's a work of wonder, it's is another thing altogether!
I have come to stand and stare
Where the voussoirs fit one stone against another stone,
No part of the bridge looks static.
It forms pleasing spaces. Even the gaps, I mean.

Not many have seen one made or heard of anyone still making them.
To see springers dressed on site, where you find them just laying there on the ground.

I let the waller neighbor know beyond the hill we plan to build one;
And on a day we meet that I might show him the line of the bridge we would like to build,
And then I begin to set the stones to span the gap to bring he and I closer once again.
I keep the idea of a friendly bridge in mind as I build.

The boulders that are randomly discarded about the hills will become useful.
And some are loaves and some so nearly balls
I have to use my wits to make them fit over the arch:
They will stay where they are, even after the form is taken out.
I wear my fingers rough with handling them.

'This is just another kind of out-door game'
(The one on the other side visits to make little of my work)
'Do we need a bridge at all?'

He is all formal and I am rustic.
My ideas may never get across.
I'm glad he does what he does so well, I tell him, I like his walls.
I only say, 'Good bridges make us good natured'.

Fall is the mischief in him, and he wonders
If he could put a notion in my head:
'Why do we have to be good natured or good neighbours? Isn't walling
Just a job. Shouldn't a bridge be something to connect a trail?
But here there is no trail. I see little reason that our lands should be connected .'
Before he built a bridge he'd ask to know
What was the point and what it will cost him.
He builds only to keep things out and make a fence with his stones.

Something there is that doesn't love a bridge,
That wants it not built.' I could say 'sour grapes' to him,
But it's not that exactly, and I'd rather
He said it for himself. I see him there
Bringing a stone grasped firmly by the top
In each hand, like an old-stone savage armed.
He moves in darkness as it seems to me~
Not of woods only and the shade of trees.
He will not go behind his father's saying,
And he likes having thought of it so well
He says again, "Good bridges don't necessarily make good neighbors."

(The poem Mending Fences by the famous American poet Robert Frost became the inspiration for me when I considered writing a poem about building bridges. It ended up being more of a humble rewrite of his beautiful piece about dry stone walls . I neither presume to have improved upon, nor wish to detract from, what he has written)

2011 Dryscaping Award

2011-10-29T01:30:00.000-04:00

Mike Melo, Brian Bailey and Patrick Callon collaborated on this lovely dry stone structure which was a design of Patrick's. They win the 2011 DSWAC Canadian Dryscaping Award, a competition which was held this year to acknowledge the best design and build in Canada for a dry stone work completed by October 2011, in the category of ' dry stone enclosure'.

This is the fourth year that an award (and a small monetary prize) has been given out by our organization.

Wallers who win this prize are chosen on the basis of photos of their recent projects submitted by email to the DSWAC. The entries are looked over and the stone project that we feel displays the highest standard of craftsmanship in the category for that year is chosen and is announced the first week in October, at the Canadian Thanksgiving Dry Stone Wall Festival. Congratulations to Mike Brian and Patrick of London Ontario for their fine work. All three men participated in the Rocktoberfest amphitheatre building project this year and Mike Melo accepted the award on behalf of all three wallers.

Next year's 2012 Dryscaping Award category will be posted on the www.dswa.ca site shortly.

Lending a hand.

2011-10-28T01:30:00.000-04:00

Big thanks to everyone who leant a hand on Little Long Lake Bridge.

There was invaluable instruction shared with us from Gavin Rose who flew in from England again to be involved. His assistance in building this the fourth bridge he and I have collaborated on in Canada made the whole event another great success. Gavin took extra time to patiently shape many of those special stones that we needed to make this bridge even more unique than the other 7 DSWAC bridge projects, with its pitched corrying and extended voussoirs and keystones. If the DSWA had pinnacle awards in Canada this surely would be a contender for the prize.

Another key player was Norman Haddow whose cheeriness, energy and knowhow injected the project with great momentum early in the first week of bridge construction. Thanks Norman for giving up some of your time in Canada after Rocktoberfest and joining us on this project.

John Scott , heritage masonry professor at Algonquin College dropped by for two days helped with big stones moving and shared some of his valuable masonry knowledge (and humour) with our students.

Thanks too to Angus who is a qualified mason too and hosted this workshop and carried and shaped a lot the big stones. He did such a great job on the pitching. He and his wife Elaine provided great hearty lunches, and plenty of refreshments and great snacks.

Thanks to the students who all gave so much to this project. Matt and Dan both from the States became good friends over the two weeks and were really hard workers on this project. They asked all the right questions and hopefully learned a lot too. Alan drove here from Guelph and was a big contributor too and although he had to leave before the bridge was completed he got to see the form pulled out on the eve of his 71st birthday. Happy birthday Alan!

All in all this was a great experience. The bridge is a sturdy looking, almost Hobbit-like structure, that well suits the mossy wooded 12 acre lot we chose to built it on. It will last a long time and charm everyone who stumbles across it. Interestingly Angus has yet to build a rustic style house on the property . I have to give him credit for having the inspiration and commitment into landscaping his newly bought property before setting about building a house on it instead of having it be just an after thought.

Little Long Lake Bridge - Oct 26 2011

2011-10-27T01:31:00.000-04:00

Pictures of pitching

2011-10-26T01:30:00.000-04:00

Gavin Rose a National Trust ranger and expert trail maker taught people about the technique of 'pitching' at the close of our two week bridge building workshop .

Pitching creates a cobblestone surface along the walking surface of a bridge or trail.

In this case the anchor stones are dug in and secured at the approaches to the bridge and then stones are set deep into the ground and laid in rows up and over the arc of the top of the structure.

Its a slow process but the finished stone path ends up being a very durable surface providing lots of traction.

The courses of stones all have to have level faces running across the width of the bridge between opposing copes the entire length of the bridge. They are supported by carefully placed hearting packed and shimmed underneath each stone.

Here's a picture of everyone who pitched in, pitching at a feverish pitch, yesterday.

Here is a pitcher perfect section of completed surface.

Today we finish the bridge and clean up the site.

(Lots of pictures of the completed Little Long Lake Bridge workshop tomorrow.)

The upside of bridge building.

2011-10-25T01:30:00.000-04:00

The arch was looking pretty sweet in the rain yesterday. It was definitely the high point of our day to see it with the form pulled out in all its glistening wet colours.

On the other hand, the downside of working on the bridge was that we were struggling in the rain and the mud most of yesterday.

Taking careful aim at the bridge

2011-10-24T01:30:00.000-04:00

Here are two people taking two very different shots at the bridge.

Hunting season is over in Ontario, but at Little Long Lake north of Kingston Ontario there are more people coming around trying catch a rare shot of the unusual dry stone structure being built here in the forest .

Tomorrow I hope to show shots of it taken aimed at its under belly.

Over the hump

2011-10-23T00:30:00.000-04:00

You know there is a big difference between being over the hump and being over the hill.
Yesterday we put all the stones up on the bridge form and completed the arch vault. We all felt exhilarated to be over the hump and a bit tired too but none of us even the older guys felt over the hill.

Johann Sebastian Rock is attempting to orchestrate some of stones into a harmonious arrangement without having to lift them.

Multi-Asking

2011-10-22T01:30:00.000-04:00

Can you guess what this is?

Can you guess what all the pink and white marks are for?

Can you guess what we are building?

Can you tell us why we are here?

Corrying

2011-10-21T01:30:00.000-04:00

The two Aussies who are participating in

this ten day bridge course , Gavin and Angus

stand beside the completed section of

'corrying' on this our third day into the project.

Before we begin the next stage of bridge construction and start the vaulted arch we must prepare an area directly under the bridge in the actual creek (there is very little water running this time of year)

We are doing this because at this bridge site the river bed could wash away and undermine the foundations. I have seen this kind of stone 'roadway' below several old arched stone railway bridges in southern Ontario. The stones are laid to form a kind of cobblestone surface.

In our application a bed is constructed by 'pitching' medium sized stones which have all been found on the property and fitted together in rows perpendicular to the direction of the stream.

This kind of stone river-bedding Norman tells us is called 'corrying'.
Does anyone know another proper architectural term for this part of a bridge?

Rock Hunting

2011-10-20T01:30:00.000-04:00

The men have caught this large granite specimen and are loading it in the back of the pickup truck. They have caught their limit now. John Scott explained that he noticed this one in the bushes, laying perfectly still, very close to where he had been hiding in waiting . "I didn't even notice this big one beside me. It didn't move at all until I started prodding it with my pry bar." The rock immediately tried to get and away bolted down the hill but the men managed to capture it (without hurting it) and now they are taking it back to the bridge site to give it a new home in the vault they are building.

Rosie is a 'Springer Spandrel'. She is specially trained to sniff out suitable stones for the rock hunters to use in the bridge.

Stone Hunters

2011-10-19T01:30:00.000-04:00

Are these men just hunters gathered together to have their picture taken before they go off to stalk deer of moose in some wooded Ontario property?

Is this man stalking something unusual and dangerous with that strange weapon?

Is this some kind of big game trap the hunters have constructed and dug all day to be able to hide in the ground?

Tune in tomorrow to find out.

Thinking With My Hands

Remembering how it all comes together.

Stone Pillows

Concentration

Crevice Gardens

Big Flags

Feature Article

Building Double

Stones with new purpose and function.

Flower of the month

Rows of Stones.

Point of View

See Walls

Another Walking Tour of Walls June 01-12, 2012

Natural Colours And Shapes

Foam Fresh Walls

Outlines

Quarry Sap

The Stone

Rockin

The Dry Stone Wall Hand book.

依 我 看 来 How's your Chinese?

Fractal Transition

Fractal Landscape

The plural of sheep is sheep

Rock Paper Scissors

Christmas is over

Up and over the wall.

Venus Gate In December

Stones are always in season.

The creative act.

A little frost and the little glued stone wall is destroyed

It's a small wall after all.

So this is Christmas

Dry Stone Christmas Music

Stone-ifferous trees.

A Wreath of Stones

Corbelling Arches and Bridges in Irelend

Stone Arches

An Arch Never Sleeps. Part 2

An Arch Never Sleeps Part 1

Coral Christmas

The Advent of the Arch.

BEETLEMASONRY Remastered Rock Rolling

Trying to understand the point.

Celebrate while you can.

Arch Chronology

Some Pre-Christmas Stacking Thoughts

Slater's Bridge in Flood

Dun Aonghasa

Walk the Walk

Outlasting qualities.

Lasting ugliness

Objectives without objections

An opening

Regrouping

Another look at Wade's memorial cairn

The Shim

On occasion.

Igloos without glue

Poor walls without borders

What would Andy do?

More photos of dry stone kayak storage structure.

Movable Fence Post

Looking back at Rocktoberfest. Part 1

Stay stones, stay.

On top of things

A ranch of the DSWAC

Coffee Table Book

A Memorial Cairn

Our chamber's nearly made

Visit back to Rockport

Revisiting the gap that we repaired

The tradition of sportsmanship.

Leftovers

The hump and the hollow. ( Using leftovers)

Frugal or Beautiful?

Pronunciation

Balloons and Bridges

Rock On and Dream Bigger

依我看来 How's your Chinese?