3 Crow

  Started the Endeavour brick job at the new 3 Crow Restaurant, owned by Josh, the current proprieter of 40 Paper in Camden. We are using original bricks from an old wall that was removed during the renovation to build a new brick facade along the northern wall, and maybe a pillar or two. The first step basically consisted of me hand-washing and removing excess mortar from 800 bricks...

  While Damon hung the Hardi-Backer...

  Nice to be working in Rockland again with Tom Potter and Donny. Potter's jobsites really are some of the most well-organized and pleasureable sites I get to be a part of. Good guys, all of them.
  Outside, the icy wind blew 60 and took down large well-established business signage. Somewhere nearby, my electrician was backing into my Tacoma with his work van. Doh!

Happy New Year!

Merry Christmas!

Nearly Natick

  Well, I haven't posted in awhile and it feels good to be sitting at the home computer again.  Damon and I have been working down in Natick, Massachusetts for the last two weeks. Natick, most famous for its unusually large Mall.

The enormous and unnavigable...

yet architecturally sound, with its art installations and modernist curves...

Natick Mall.

  Not so, the Red Roof Inn, where we have chosen to stay. The roof is not red and the traffic outside the room is relentless...

  The staff is freindly enough, but you don't really ever see them after you check in. The rooms are relatively clean, if not sparse and tend toward being on the insanely hot side. We turned the heat completely off at night and it still felt like it was 80 degrees or more. I suspect there might be a fiery chasm beneath the building that heats the place with geothermal gases and possibly punishes the souls of the wicked.

  The job itself is just a few miles from the motel and sits on a little pond/lake near the Wayland town line.

  The job is Kurt Snyder's of Stonescapes and we are all grateful for the work. I mean, no one really wants to drive to Natick and stay away from their family for a week at a time, but it's work in the winter and anything is better than being unemployed.
  The stonework is a round-rock veneer with 3/8 joints and there seems to be alot of it. Stone veneer on the house was completed by the previous masons and so we are trying to match that work, which is often difficult. Eveyone's styles vary and all masons follow different rules as to what is stylistically acceptable.

  My work around the pipes...

  Damon's work around the corner...

  Kurt and Nate working on the stairs...

  The twelve-inch short wall...

  Nate, Mike Fitz, Damon and I picking rock...

  And of course, no stay out of town is complete without a visit to the local hot-spots, which on this particular night was the Samba Steak and Sushi House in Framingham. The hibachi chef put on a marvelous culinary show and the food was excellent. Kurt was also nice enough to cover the entire bill, which is saying something when drinking masons are involved.

  Grateful for the work, but glad to be home.

Got Plankton?

  It's been a few weeks since we finished up the patio at Bigelow Laboratories in Boothbay, and I'm finally getting around to posting the pics. This was another job that came down to us from Eric at E.M. Wood Construction, via the relentless Dan Ucci of Ledge Hill Creations.
  The material is a concrete paver made to resemble bluestone and the steps and banding are cut and thermalled granite.

Broadview Farm

  Here are some quick pics of the sitting wall we did on the porch of the new horse arena built by John Libby Houses and Barns at Broadview Farm in Hope.  Libby and his guys were great, as always, and the almost supernatural magnificence of the arena clearly illuminates the incredible level of skill they operate on. It is truly breathtaking. The entire farm is breathtaking. Broadview is an amazing 400 acres or so of probably the most beautiful land in Hope and the owners have devoted most of it to the 22 or 23 rescue horses they have rehabilitated there. Their hearts are as large and grand as their vision, and it is a pleasure just to be a part of what they are doing.

Thomaston Granite

  We have been terribly busy and awfully behind, so I haven't posted in a few weeks, but here are some before and after shots of the last project we finished. The job is another for Endeavour, in the back yard of a large old house in historic downtown Thomaston. I took some photos when I originally went to look at the job, and as you can see, it was badly cracked and pitching forward dangerously.

  I was struck immediately by the beauty of the place, however, and jumped at the opportunity to be a part of such a great restoration project.  The owner came out with an old cigar box she had found in the attic when she bought the place, inside of which were some black and white photographs of the original structure.

  Amazing! I wanted the job...
  Then my good friend, Don Savarice, who was doing some interior restoration, pointed out a circular iron and concrete structure in the center of the lawn.

  Apparently, when Don had started working on the house, there was a large pile of decaying wood in the back yard and the owner asked him if he could remove it. Well, he did and lo and behold, beneath it was this incredible ornate wrought-iron fountain base. Out of curiosity, they went into the basement and searched around until they found a mystery-knob, which they turned... And there was water! Right up out of the little fountain-spout. Incredible!
  I left the site determined to come back and rebuild the wall and sure enough, we were doing just that two or three weeks later.  It was a difficult project, due to the size of the stones and the height of the wall, but we managed. Actually, a massive hats-off to both Damon and Dave Curry, who were there much more than I was and built most of what you see in the pictures.

  I can't wait to see it again in another fifty years, when the vines have grown back.
 

Stonescapes

  Spent the last few weeks down in Freeport working with Kurt Snyder and Stonescapes building some granite walls. As always, Kurt is a pleasure to work with, and it was nice to work with Lance again, as well as Zack and Bija.

                                                              Damon and Lance...

                                                     Kurt and Lance's Fine Stonewall...

The Daily Street News

  Sixteen feet of retaining wall out of Guinea Ridge wallstone, which is basically yet another variation on the Heritage Valley, Belfast Heritage, Norumbega strain. It comes off of Guinea Ridge out in Burketville and is sold by the Pease family, who are probably the hardest working and most honest people I have ever dealt with. (Also can be found at Viking Hardscapes on Rt. 90.) I like it because it seems to have a good variety of thicknesses and we wanted to have some thinner ones for this smaller wall, so as to still have some movement across the face. If you build an eighteen-inch tall wall out of six-inch thick stones, you basically end up with a wall three rocks high, and it just doesn't look very exciting. This, on the other hand, this is exciting.

  Look at the colors, too. Actually, the rock is still pretty dirty from being in the ground and will weather well over time, decreasing the browns and bringing out the blues and greens.

  We even ripped out a few bricks that were under the fireplace, and replaced them with wallstone, which really integrated the whole structure and brought everything together.

  We did this job for Michael Geer of Celebration Works Carpentry (236-0030) and a customer of his from my home state of Tennessee. Yee-haw! She was really nice and Michael is a pleasure to work with. He's easy-going, with a boat-builder's eye to detail and a classic love of craftsmanship, and we are looking forward to working with him in the future.