Lyons Red Sandstone quarry blocks from Loukonen Brothers Stone used as a retaining wall. The stones are set in place by a backhoe. Photo courtesy of Loukonen Brothers Stone.

by M.W. Penn

Stone is sometimes divided into two categories with opposing architectural demeanors. As the polished façade of palaces or monuments, stone expresses wealth and power and permanence. But in the humble cottages of generations of farmers and craftsmen, stone often appears as a modest building material supplied freely by the surrounding earth. These two faces of stone reflect the effort and skill used in the fabrication of the material. In his essay "Stone in Twentieth Century Architecture", Jonathan Ochshorn states, "Finely worked, accurately cut blocks, sometimes of exotic origin or polished to a jewel-like finish, characterize monumental architecture; while fieldstone, rubble, or roughly-worked stone set in thick mortar beds are more often associated with modest works."

Any uncut or roughly cut stone of irregular size used in landscape design — for walls or paving or stepping stones — is referred to as rubble stone. Because the rounded rubble stone foundations of many historic houses also form the backdrop for a garden, the bases of these homes, too, form an essential part of the design of the surrounding landscape.

Rubble stone creates a natural setting for garden ponds. Loukonen Brothers stone is excellent for water projects because it is 98% quartz and doesn't affect the Ph of the water. Photo courtesy of Loukonen Brothers Stone.

This isn't limited to the homes of past centuries. An entire movement of modern architecture rooted in an Arts and Crafts sensibility has appropriated and formalized rubble stone, so that it also has become commonplace in contemporary domestic landscapes, especially where houses are based on local craft traditions. Frank Lloyd Wright's desert rubble masonry, first used at Taliesin West (1937) in Scottsdale, Arizona, is a stunning example. Wright set rough stones in a concrete formwork so that they became visible on the surface of the wall and set an informal tone for the enveloping landscape.

Rubble stone has also been adopted by other 20th-century architects who have developed wall systems combining the stone with concrete technology by injecting pressurized concrete into forms filled with the rough stones. This type of construction has become a popular and inexpensive material for garden walls. Finnish born, Yale educated architect Eero Saarinen (1910-1962) adapted it for his design of Stiles and Morse Colleges at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut. Saarinen had initially pursued sculpture as his art of choice and, because of this, sculpture was included as an integral part of his design. The sculpture in the garden of Stiles and Morse Colleges exemplifies the concept of a modern artistic composition framed against the backdrop of a wall of rubble stone.

	Wall systems formed by injecting pressurized concrete into forms filled with rough stones have become popular for garden walls. Finnish born, Yale educated architect Eero Saarinen (1910-1962) adapted the material for his design of Stiles and Morse Colleges at Yale University in New Haven, Connecticut. Photo copyright E. F. Prokop.

At the beginning of the twenty-first century, architects effectively used rubble stone for still another purpose. In 2001, DRS Architects of Pittsburgh used quarry block rubble from Raducz Stone Quarry to construct the anti-terrorist wall that surrounds and protects the Federal Bureau of Investigation Headquarters in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Raducz, with nineteen employees, produces 10,000 tons of Homewood formation sandstone rubble from their western Pennsylvania quarry each year.

Often used in landscapes for casual stepping stones and sturdy steps, slabs of rubble stone can be an inexpensive alternative to flagstone and yield a dramatic effect. In general, steps serve many functions in a garden, creating safe passage and ease of movement between grades while accenting different garden levels and defining outdoor spaces. Informal steps, made easily by placing rubble stepping stones directly into the ground in a random fashion, provide an attractive solution in an informal setting.

Informal steps can be made easily by placing rubble stepping stones directly into the ground. Photo courtesy of Loukonen Brothers Stone.

Rubble stone is often hard igneous stone such as basalt, gneiss or granite, but limestone and sandstone are also excellent when used in this form. Woody Mercer of Cumberland Mountain Stone in Crossville, Tennessee, 75 miles north of Chattanooga and 65 miles west of Knoxville, quarries quartzitic sandstone, a sedimentary stone best known for its variegated earth tone coloring rich with iron veining. Often the stone is fabricated as split, pitched faced rubble stone specifically for landscape projects. It is used in the construction of walls and as edging for beds and ponds. In an unusual choice of natural stone over a less expensive material, the city of Knoxville, Tennessee chose this stone for retaining walls on highway exit ramps.

A rustic entrance garden of wildflowers, grasses and rubble stone. Photo courtesy of Loukonen Brothers Stone.

In the Beech Hill Quarry above Lyons, Colorado, five generations of the Loukonen family have quarried stone since 1890. The Beech Hill formation is stratified in some areas and solid (Hardrock) in others. Generally there are layers of Hardrock on top of the stratified stone and the Hardrock must be removed before slabs and flagstone for Loukonen dimensional cut Lyons Red Sandstone can be quarried. The large stones are removed by heavy equipment and all of the other stone is removed by hand with hammer, wedges and bars.

	Lyons red quarry blocks and slabs with crushed stone on the terraces. The blocks range from four to thirty-six inches thick and are one to ten feet long. Photo courtesy of Loukonen Brothers Stone.

Naturally angular and generally having a flat top and bottom, Lyons Red Sandstone quarry blocks range in size from 50 to 5000 pounds and can be used as retaining walls which are set in place by an excavator or backhoe. As deadmen, or pieces built into the wall which extend into the bank or fill behind the wall, the rough stones use the weight and mass of the fill to secure the wall in place. Walls of this rough faced sandstone have become very popular in the region.

A wall of rubble stone protects an FBI headquarters building on the south side of Pittsburgh. Photo copyright Dennis Marsico courtesy of Raducz Stone Quarry.

A homogenous mass with the same chemical compounds as the stratified stone, Hardrock does not have the ability to be split. Formed under more heat and pressure, it has a larger crystalline makeup. It is used for all of Loukonen products, but most often the heavier 6" to 14" cut materials.

Stone found under the Lyons Red Sandstone formation is Pennsylvania flow stone. The name comes from the stone's level or strata in the Earth's crust. Shot- Drilled and blasted out with explosives, it is not bedded like the Lyons Red Sandstone and is much softer sandstone.

	Sculpture in the garden of Stiles and Morse Colleges exemplifies the concept of a modern artistic composition framed against the backdrop of a wall of rubble stone. Photo copyright E. F. Prokop.

Loukonen Brothers Stone sells all three types as rubble rock sorted into Quarry blocks, Quarry Drywall, which is laid without mortar, and Cutface Drywall which consists of edges and pieces removed from the production of their dimensional stone products and has one cut face. Cut with a hydraulic stone cutter (Chris Cutter/CJ Tool), Cutface Drywall has a straight yet irregular edge, somewhat like a chiseled edge and called a snap cut edge. All three products are used for walls, pond edging, waterfalls, and traffic barriers and also in Artscapes which mimic the monolithic gardens of the southwest. The stone is excellent for water projects because it is 98% quartz and doesn't affect the Ph of the water.

In Avondale, Pennsylvania, D'Amico Quarry, Inc., uses Avondale Brownstone rubble for retaining walls, and building stones. The Avondale quarry has been in operation for over 75 years and is in its third generation of D'Amico ownership; currently owned and operated by John D'Amico, the quarry has 10 employees.

This saw band, random length, pitched face rubble stone from Cumberland Stone Mountain was shaped by a chisel. It forms a retaining wall on a highway exit ramp in Knoxville, Tennessee. Photo courtesy of Cumberland Mountain Stone.

D'Amico, Inc., no longer "blasts" the stone out with dynamite, but instead uses an excavator with an allied hammer to extract the stone. Using the excavator in lieu of dynamite is much safer for both the environment and quarry workers, and the stone retains a more natural appearance.

The quarry produces about 1,500 tons of mosaic stone each year. The walls of the Rose Garden at Brandywine Park, Wilmington, Delaware, provide a stunning example of D'Amico stone, and demonstrate the warm, welcoming character this rubble stone brings to a public garden.

	A five foot square column was built to a height of twelve feet to mark the entrance to an Atlanta office complex. The broken face rubble stone was split on a hydraulic splitter and laid dry face. Photo courtesy of Cumberland Mountain Stone.

In Whitehall, New York, Adirondack Natural Stone, LLC, too, finds that quarry remnants make beautiful and practical wall stone. Sold loose or in pallets, the rustic and natural look of Adirondack Natural Wallstone has become an inexpensive solution for landscape walls, blending easily into rustic surroundings.

Irregular in size and shape, varied in composition and color, informal by nature, rubble stone defines the texture of a landscape and bestows individuality to any setting.

A rustic sunken patio of Avondale Brownstone from D'Amico Quarry, Inc. The walls, in a rubble pattern, were designed and constructed by Eugenio Zavaleta. Photo courtesy of D'Amico Quarry, Inc.

References:
Ochshorn, Jonathan; Stone in Twentieth Century Architecture; Encyclopedia of Twentieth Century Architecture; Fitzroy Dearborn (Taylor and Francis), New our, New York.

Credits:
Andre Hagadorn, Adirondack Natural Stone, LLC, 8986 State Route 4, Whitehall, NY 12887 phone: (518) 499-0602

Woody Mercer, President, Cumberland Mountain Stone, a division of Turner Brothers Stone of Crossville, Inc., PO Box 297, Crossville, TN 38557 phone: (800) 334-7719

Elaine D'Amico, D'Amico Quarry, Inc., 1703 Baltimore Pike, Avondale, PA 19311 phone: (610) 268-0115

Mike Loukonen, Loukonen Brothers Stone, 12993 North Foothills Highway, Longmont, CO. 80503 phone: (303) 823-6268

Frank Raducz, Raducz Stone Quarry, 313 Pittsburgh Road, Butler, PA 16002; phone: (724) 352-3984 e-mail: raduczstone@yahoo.com

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