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Stone is the oldest building material recognised by man. The garden environment offers a wide range of applications for stone in some shape or form. Whether it is traditional or contemporary space, raw or finished stone fits simply into the space.
Working well with plants and in combination with other hard landscape materials, even the latest piece of rock seamlessly blends into the garden with time.
The stone type you use and the way you use it will be governed by the overall style of your garden. Because of the surrounding environment of a garden, local stone always works best as it naturally blend into an area it is already accustomed to. However, the application or role of stone as a landscaping material is ultimately down to your personal choice and taste.
Statues and sculptural pieces that have been hewn from solid rock are more preferable to reconstituted stone. Even though the quality of reconstituted stone pieces is improving rapidly, genuine stone features are more honest and they don't need to try hard to please.
Flooring probably provides the broadest use of natural stone. Visually soft, it seems to merge into the garden with ease. It has an exceptional quality that looks attractive in any garden.
There are various stone types. Sandstone is a sedimentary stone with smooth, understated tone that gives a timeless look.
At home in both urban and rural settings, quarried stone can have numerous surface treatments applied to it, ranging from simple splitting to rubbing and diamond sawing to give it a clean or irregular (riven) surface.
Sandstones, for which York stone is one of many, are available in just about any size, but are mainly supplied as random rectangular or square pieces.
The most thriving paving patterns work on a random basis, working from a central key stone and avoiding straight joints in any section. Perfect for large expanses of terracing, use large-scale stones to their best benefit by laying flags simply and boldly.
Although extremely popular, particularly in recent years, crazy paving (where irregular pieces of stones are laid in a random fashion) is best avoided. It rapidly dominates a space, can boggle the eye, and appear unattractive unless laid very well.
Limestone is another sedimentary rock that is useful for flooring and walling. However, it is not quite as hardwearing as sandstone, and so durability needs to be checked with your supplier. There is a huge array of limestone types and they differ from region to region.
Reconstituted stone slabs are becoming more like the real thing and have advantages of their own over natural stone. Light and easy to lay and in uniform sizes, they are also more cost-effective.
Granite is a hard, dense, igneous rock ranging in colour from pink through to grey and then black, frequently flecked with crystals.
Although granite is available in sawn slabs suitable for paving, their cost is another factor that you need to consider.
In my opinion, granite has a cold, grey look which is not particularly attractive when used in quantity in a garden setting.
If you combine this with an uneven surface that is uncomfortable to walk on, you may consider it best to use granite as a trim edging material to other surface materials such as gravel.
However, small pieces of granite can be used to form intricate patterns and detailing. Due to its durability, granite makes a striking option for driveways.
