Contacted to look at a wall in disrepair, I ended up completely rebuilding a drystone wall at a dentist’s office just outside of downtown Asheville. I added a stone bench to the street side of the wall to invite neighbors and passersby to sit and enjoy the space. The bench, the seat back and the arm rests were all cut from a single slab of sandstone. I cut the big pieces with feathers and wedges and trimmed the edges with the chisels. The sidewalk slopes along this face, so the bench varies in height, though the sitting surface and arm rests are level. The wall steps up just past the bench to catch the growing earth bank.
-
- Springtime wall
-
- Drystone wall in process
-
- Finishing the drystone wall
-
- The bench plan
-
- Installing bench slab
-
- The finished stone bench
-
- Drystone retaining wall
-
- Allie finding marbles
-
- Drystone wall close-up
-
- Snowy day panorama
Download a postcard of this project.