LAYING DOWN THE (PAVER) LAW

Toadflax Farm, late April

            Toadflax Farm is coming right along. Lots of passers-by seem fascinated by the front-yard vegetable garden concept. After 15 years on NE 13^th Street, we’re finally getting beyond a mere nodding acquaintanceship with our near neighbors, and meeting ones who live farther down the block for the first time.

            No one ever accused us of being breezy extroverts when we’re at home.

Tim and I took today off to put in a full day in the yard, pruning away sun-blocking tree limbs, hilling the potatoes again, potting up the three new tomatoes given us by grower extraordinaire Christine and planting the 90 or so annuals and perennials I stashed in the truck when we visited Another Place in Thyme last Tuesday. (That sounds like a lot, but it’s only about 25 one-galloners and the rest three- and four-inchers. No, really, it isn’t a lot. For me.)

Echinacea paradoxa

             

            This year’s new-to-me specimens include Echinacea paradoxa. Haven’t ever had much luck with E. purpurea (plain ol’ purple coneflower and the zillions of recent hybrids), so the thought of giving another species a go appeals to me. The flowers look enough like Rudbeckia that perhaps my coneflower jinx will be broken.

Stromanthe sanguinea 'Tricolor'

 

 I’m also trying out Stromanthe sanguine ‘Tricolor,’ a tender foliage plant hailing from Brazil, and… 

Gomphrena 'Fireworks'

… Delosperma cooperi ‘Fire Spinner,’ an ice plant that produces blooms in an eye-popping combination of yellow, lavender, magenta and orange, if you believe the tag. It should go well with Gomphrena ‘Fireworks,’ which doesn’t much resemble its stumpy little purple-, pale pink- or white-flowering cousins. Christine introduced me to ‘Fireworks’ last season; thanks to our mild winter, some of them overwintered. With the new ones I bought last week, our front yard is going to look like the Fourth of July all summer.

*****

Well, enough about me. Let’s wind up this dissertation on pavers.

Dry-laid pavers are a breeze to install. Getting the ground ready to lay the pavers, however, is another matter entirely. And it all hinges on level, a concept you will come to believe exists exclusively to drive you ’round the bend.

Here’s a pictorial demonstration of the process, starring Tim and me and our friend Cornelia’s front yard. Like me, Cornelia has a fixation about losing lawn. She decided she’d like the strip of land between her graveled parking area and the sidewalk converted from scrubby grass and weeds to a little shrubbery bounded by matching walkways. (The pictures are dark and I’m dressed like Nanook of the North because the action took place on a January afternoon during a "normal" coastal North Carolina winter. As a point of interest, it was one of the last outings for those purple overalls with the Eeyore appliqués my mom thought I’d look cute in.)

ASSEMBLE YOUR MATERIALS. Having the right tools makes any job go better. Here’s what you’ll need, gathered all in one place for ease of access, to get your project rolling:

Pavers (duh).

Step 1a

Paver base, a cindery material that compacts to form an almost concrete-like underlayment.

Sand to fill cracks between the pavers. The kind pictured here is leveling sand, which resembles mortar sand. I prefer play sand, used for filling kids’ sandboxes. The leveling sand’s grains are large (relatively speaking, of course) and angular so they form tighter bonds when compacted. Play sand grains are finer and rounded, so it’s easier to get more of them into tiny openings, but they don’t mesh as well. Take your pick.

Step 1b

A tamper. Ours is powered by what Tim calls “Norwegian steam,” but you can also rent a powered one, looking, sounding and handling rather like a jack-hammer.

An expensive masonry saw, with accompanying masonry blade (if you’re doing an extensive installation, you may need more than one blade.) You might be able to rent these. The alternative is to plan your project to be perfectly straight with only precisely 90-degree turns and of a width and length that accommodate the exact dimensions of your bricks. Obviously, we opted for the saw. 

The stuff in the bucket is polymeric sand, used as the final step to set the pavers.

More paver base. You’ll want lots of paver base.

A section of 4x4”, for pounding recalcitrant pavers into submission instead of into multiple pieces. Two-by-four sections work just as well.

What’s missing from this photo is a shovel, a trowel and a long level. I’m assuming you know what those things look like.

Step 1c

And the small stuff: a short level; masons’ twine; a chisel (necessary if you don’t spring for the masonry saw);  a small sledge-hammer; a rubber mallet; and a T-square (for marking bricks that need to be cut). Not shown: 18”-long stakes.

Step 2

 

STAKE OUT THE SITE, using the stakes and masons’ twine.

 

Step 3

DIG OUT THE SITE. Here’s where things start getting interesting. You need to excavate to the depth of your paver plus at least three inches. That’ll put the finished project at ground level. If you live in an area where the ground freezes, you have to go deeper and build a thicker base to prevent frost-heaving. Ask around locally for advice. I live in a reasonable climate.

Step 4 (that's a long level I'm holding)

LEVEL THE EXCAVATION,  called "screeding." Tim and I use a section of 2x4”—ideally the width of the dug-out area, but things are seldom ideal—to start the leveling ball rolling. The process unfolds more smoothly if you take great pains to level the work area at this juncture.

Step 5

TAMP THE DIRT. Keep checking (and checking, and checking) for level.

Step 6

 ADD PAVER BASE, TAMP & LEVEL. Repeat until you have a firm and level base with just enough vertical space left so the pavers will be at grade. Don’t stint on paver base: it’s what keeps the finished surface from buckling or sinking.

Step 7

RE-TAMP & RE-LEVEL. Now that you’re properly obsessed with level, you can start laying the bricks.

Possible paver patterns

CHOOSE A PATTERN. Running bond is the easiest, but it involves a half-brick to start alternate rows. I like a modified basketweave, myself. Unfortunately, I also like curves and odd-angle turns. Fortunately, we own a masonry saw.

 

LAY THE PAVERS. Work across the smallest dimension of the space. Pound the pavers tight against the outside edges and one another using the rubber mallet. Although not absolutely necessary, it is helpful to have hard edges to work to. (Sand not being the most stable of soils, the Fitzes install a standing brick edging around the perimeters of our projects, a topic I'll cover next time.) Fill cracks with leveling or play sand as you finish each small section. (Tim uses a scrub brush for this purpose. I use my gloved hands.) Continually check for level, brick to brick and row to row. If you’re building on sloping ground, ensure that the angle of rise or descent remains constant.  Lay the board-section over the pavers and use the sledge-hammer to whack them securely into the base. Rub more sand into the joints. When you’re finished, spread polymeric sand over the entire project and water it in, following the directions on the package. When dry, the polymers act sort of like cement, only not so difficult to remove or replace individual pavers should that become necessary.

All finished!

CONGRATULATE YOURSELF ON A JOB WELL DONE. Treat yourself to a beer, or, if you’re a Fitzgerald, a bracing cup of coffee. Especially in January.

            So that’s all there is to it. The secret to all brick and stone work is to take your time. Don’t rush. If you don’t like the way a single paver or a whole section looks, take it out and do it over. Where craftsmanship is concerned, no one awards extra points for getting done first.

            Well, time to get out in the yard. Thanks for dropping by.

                                                                                    Kathy   

EARTH DAY SUPPLEMENTAL

            When I was a kid trying to up the number of annual gift-getting occasions, I asked my mom why, if there’s a Mother’s Day and a Father’s Day, isn’t there a Children’s Day? “Because every day is Children’s Day,” she replied. “It’s the moms and dads people forget to appreciate.”

Oh.

For most of us, Earth Day, like Veterans Day, feels like that. Only on those officially sanctioned dates do we get all revved up and teary-eyed over our failures to pay attention to the planet or the people who volunteer to defend our standard of living against all comers (except the politicians: there is no defense against them save for voter-enforced term limits). But the very next morning, our lives’ business resumes as usual. We fail to toss the newspaper in the recycling bin; we buy our lattés in “disposable” plastic or styrofoam cups; we relegate the members of the armed services to their customary out-of-sight, out-of-mind status.

Well, I’m only one person, you say. What difference can I make?

Of course no single individual can solve the world’s problems. But the game-changing thing you can do—starting now—is to recycle some of the tons of waste you generate each year. What you can do is reduce the amount of frivolous driving you do. What you can do is plant a seed, or a tree. What you can do is to actually consume all the food you buy instead of consigning some to landfills. What you can do is start a compost pile. What you can do is to remember that everything you do has an impact, however tiny, on the planet and its people. What you can do is to look, really look, around you, and remember how interdependent we all are.  

The moms, the dads, the veterans, the earth need your awareness that they’re out there, waiting for you to see, and acknowledge, and understand how we all connect. The most important thing you can do is to pay attention. And that makes all the difference in the world.

Another thing you can do is click on this link for ten tips for reusing plastic bags, because every little bit helps.

Thanks for dropping by.

                                                                        Kathy

THE GREAT WALL

Old-field toadflax

            “Let’s call it Toadflax Farm," I said to Tim, "because of the bushels of old-field toadflax I yank out every spring.” (Old-field toadflax is an attractive, airy wildflower/weed with sweet little lavender-blue blooms and a germination rate close to 120%.)

We surveyed our transformed front yard, now a maze of raised beds and Grow-Bags festooned with miles of toe-grabbing bird-netting. The faint dead-animal stench of the soured milk we’d poured on the Grow-Bag tomatoes (for the calcium, that’s why) wafted past on the evening breeze. “More like ‘Green Acres,’” my husband replied.

Toadflax Farm, scoffers notwithstanding

Hmph. My enthusiasm cannot be dampened this early in the season. I go walkabout every morning, camera and harvesting colander in hand, looking for new stuff. Yesterday, almost all the beans had sprouted where the day before only one bent stem could be seen. The peas and strawberries dribble in. (I’ve learned you have to plant a hell of a lot of shelling peas to bring in even a modest crop. I don’t really have the room, so mostly I eat them raw as I pick them.) Baby tomatoes and cucumbers proliferate. Thirty out of 31 peanuts sown are up. The potatoes will need their first hilling this afternoon.

  I am so psyched. I’d rather be puttering around my own yard than working gainfully, or blogging. April, ever one of my favorite months, has outdone herself this year.

*****

Now let’s move on from paean to paving.

Open, flat patios work fine for extending the deck or house out into the garden; they look a bit forlorn, though, when floating on their own out in the yard. Some clients of ours envisioned a curving floored space, complete with firepit, for outdoor entertaining; close to but not abutting the back of the house; and viewable from inside the house. Accordingly, they hired a mason (who managed to pave over only one irrigation head in the process: good thing Tim’s the Leonardo da Vinci of integrated landscape systems). The two-dimensional reality left something to be desired, however. In an attempt to provide the missing j’en ne sais quoi, they tethered the floating patio to the house with a straight and narrow flagstone path at a 94° angle from the bottom step. Didn’t help much.

A friend recommended Fitzgeralds Gardening. When consulted, we suggested a seating wall--so-called because the top of the wall is wide and stable enough to sit on--to enclose the patio, and a wider, more meandering path.

And that’s what we did.

This was in the days before we had a digital camera, so the work-in-progress photos have disappeared into the black recesses of the office closet, probably never to see the light of day again. But I did manage to salvage the before-and-afters for your edification. What a difference a wall makes! 

"Floating" patio

"Floating" patio, grounded

As does the curved as opposed to stick-straight path. (Notice that instead of skirting the clump of three crape myrtles, we routed the path through it. When the trees leaf out, passing among them will make visitors feel more like they’re on their way to a destination. It’s a subtle, subliminal design trick, but it really works.

"Floating" patio tethered better

"Floating" patio tethered, barely

Low walls help define garden rooms, too. One lady asked Tim and me to impose civility on part of her wild-ish back yard, and give her a reason to leave the screened porch. Here’s what we came up with.

Garden room from the rear

Garden room from the front

Low edging wall

Have bermed planting areas that could use some retaining? Need an edging that prevents lawn from creeping where you don’t want it to go? Dream of stopping the lawn guy from slowly decreasing your grassed area by pretending a weed-whacker is an edging tool? A low wall might just be the answer to all these landscaping conundrums. 

Retaining wall, take one:

après ça, le déluge

In this age of proliferating concrete wall-block systems, anyone with a reasonably strong back and knees can build a low wall. I keep emphasizing “low” because anything higher than 18 to 24 inches requires battening. If the word “battening” means nothing to you, don’t plan on going higher than three tiers, four as an absolute maximum. (Wall blocks run to around four inches in height.) For actual retaining walls—designed to hold back tons of soil—hire a professional. Ask for references, and check them. We have a friend who contracted with his mulch provider (?) to install a five-foot high, 115-foot long retaining wall above a pond. The first-time wall builders had no idea they needed to batten such a structure; ergo, the first heavy rainfall toppled several sections and undercut the base in places, because it was improperly done.  

Oh, dear.

Should you undertake a do-it-yourself wall project, the local home-improvement emporium is a good place to start. (Here are links to the relevant webpages for Lowes and Home Depot.) They stock all you’ll need in the way of materials and tools. Selection has improved tremendously from the days of one-size-fits-all concrete lozenges, with more shapes, colors, finishes (i.e., tumbled, smooth, scored) and price ranges to choose from.

More Lowes wall blocks & pavers

Some Lowes wall blocks & pavers

 

Paver company catalogs

If you’re not a DYI kind of person, visit a brick- or stone-yard instead. In the Oak Island/Southport area, check out Bianchi’s Brickyard. Proprietor Dave Bianchi is a master mason, which is evident the second you pull up in front of the place. (Those of us who watched it never cease to marvel at the transformation of a nondescript vinyl-sided house set toward the back of a weedy lot to the lovely building and grounds of today.) Tim and I source materials for our projects there, because Dave carries the more up-scale Anchor Block's Holland Pavers (a division of Metromont Materials) and Belgard lines that can be tailored to the particular job, and provides tons (haha) of professional advice.

The orange wall; or, Caveat emptor

Speaking of professional advice, here’s some: choose colors carefully. Err on the side of neutral greys and tans. One client chose the wall block herself for an installation we did. She meant to pick up a subtle pink tone in the bricks of the house, but she didn't have a spare to take with her to Lowes for comparison. Although you can’t really see it in its full glory in this picture, what she got was an orange wall.

*****

Must run. Oak Island, it seems, has lost its deer immunity: my ‘Red Zebra’ baby tomatoes and the top of the plant were gone yesterday morning, and poor ‘Black Trifele’ now nothing but a stalk. So we’re off to Lowes to investigate fencing options. No, a low wall won’t do.

Thanks for dropping by.

                                                                        Kathy

P.S.—Welcome to Laura, décor addict, artist and musician, who arrived as GFTGU’s 15^th follower this morning. I’m glad you’re here.

POUNDING THE PAVERS

            "Where do you come up with ideas for all the things you write about?" my friend Chuck asked last Tuesday evening over ribs and his wife Maggie's fabulous, secret-recipe potato salad.

The French House, Wilmington, NC

            Ideas for topics come from all over the place. For example, Miss Janice, owner of The French House bed-and-breakfast in Wilmington, phoned on a Sunday morning not too long ago. About to convert her dirt driveway to period paving bricks, she wanted to know what to use to underneath them to prevent the pavers from sinking into our sandy soil.

            Well, huh, I thought as we chatted. There’s a post.

            Tim and I do a bit of paver and wall-block work in our business. Almost all our projects are dry-laid, meaning we use no mortar. The ground in southeastern North Carolina never freezes; ergo, it never heaves.  I enjoy the work, as it requires precision. (Although Nature abhors a straight line, those of us afflicted by anal-retentive tendencies secretly adore them.) We’ve installed circular decorative medallions, angular sidewalks, flat patios, patios incorporating steps, seating walls, low retaining walls and, once, a grand surround for a fountain. We’ve also run about a mile of standing-paver edging.

            Yep, I’d say we know our pavers.

Some paver colors & styles

            Pavers come in various sizes, shapes and colors, and, for the purposes of this discussion, include concrete stepping stones, or “steppers.” There are even paver “systems,” sets of blocks in differing shapes that fit together to form patterns. A visit to the home improvement emporium or—better yet—your local brickyard can leave you reeling with ideas for embellishing and enhancing your garden. Prices range from very affordable do-it-yourself to moderately expensive hire-someone-else-to-do-the-heavy-lifting projects, to over-the-top master mason-created objets d’art.  

            In the interest of getting this post out before the end of April—the farm in our front yard consumes a great deal of my time these days, not to mention our beloved regular clients who have grown weary of looking at their tired violas and bolted mustards—here are some pictures of several Fitzgerald projects from ridiculously easy to quite complex for a couple of gardeners giving themselves on-the-job training.

            Just below on the left is an example of Belgian block plopped on the ground to serve as edging. I love Belgian block, with its rough-hewn surfaces, unique cubed forms and considerable heft. The downside? It’s pricey. I dream of one day having a dry-laid Belgian-block driveway: stately, textured, pervious, and great traction. But for now, 12 feet of single-wide edging represents the extent of my budget. (I blew the bulk of it on what Tim indulgently calls my $700 potato.)

A proper Belgian block sidewalk

at The Stone Garden,

Wilmington's premier stoneyard

Rudimentary Belgian block edging

            

             Here are two toss-it-on-the-ground projects utilizing square steppers. I wanted a level place behind our screened porch to put pots on and to quell a stubborn crop of fleabane; our friend Cornelia needed a hard surface on which to drag her garbage cans to the curb. Lest you be misled by my literary insouciance, “toss it on the ground” doesn’t really describe the installation. Level is the operative word here, and will pop up many, many times in the next few posts.

Steppers make it easier to get

your garbage to the curb

Steppers make a base for pots

           

            

            Next we undertook a sidewalk, also at Cornelia’s, that presented new challenges and educational opportunities. First, part of the space was really narrow; second, the walkway took two 45-degree turns; and lastly, we wanted to maintain the integrity of the pattern, a kind of modified basketweave. All three required sawn-to-shape pavers. To make precision cuts with minimum effort, you need a special chop-saw with special, heavy-duty blades.  Unfortunately, Tim muscled through using a masonry blade on his regular chop-saw. Live and learn, right? Still, the project turned out very acceptably.

Challenge # 1

Challenge # 2

            

Notice how evenly the water's dripping down

             When our friends Charlotte and Tom bought a graceful, three-tiered fountain for their back yard, they asked us to install it. Level is paramount when dealing with water features: nothing reveals the tiniest tilt to port or starboard, fore or aft as glaringly as water. Other aesthetics to consider when constructing a base are shape, color, and dominance. The fountain was grey and circular, so we built the base to match in order to showcase the fountain rather than its surround. (It can also be done the other way ’round, and we’ll get there shortly.) For now, suffice it to say Charlotte’s fountain introduced us to The Circle Kit, one of those paver "systems" mentioned above.

This is what you call an irregular shape

          Charlotte and Tom loved our fountain job so much they asked us to continue the paver motif by building a patio off the back steps. Bordered by an extruded-concrete edging, the challenge here was the area’s irregular shape. Another learning opportunity!

Circular medallion in the center

A semi-circular medallion at the bottom step echoed the full circle at the geographical center of the space. We filled in with a gently curving running bond. Having by now obtained the special chop-saw and special heavy-duty blades, all necessary cutting went smoothly.

 

The step the mason forgot

The original brick mason paid meticulous attention to the job specifications: the plans called for three steps, so three steps are what he built, regardless of the fact that there were 13 inches between the bottom step's tread and the ground instead of the seven-inch height of the rest of the risers. I pointed out this little lawsuit waiting to happen to Charlotte. “So fix it,” she said. We did, and quite elegantly, too, if I say so myself. Tim insisted we mortar the upright bricks for sturdiness. I insisted the same uprights be a different color for visibility. (Scarred by 12 years spent in lawyer-land, I see potential liability suits everywhere.)

Remember me saying fountain surrounds can be subtle or not? Here’s our “or not.” An enormously fun project to design and execute, this paver / seating-wall / entrance column construction took eight weeks on the ground to complete. It ended up costing 35 times as much as the putative centerpiece, a rococo Italianate-style fountain. Apparently, the angels were as pleased with the outcome as the homeowners, because we have photographic evidence.

A heavenly blessing

The grand fountain surround

Next time, a bit about wall-blocks, standing-brick edgings, and a primer on laying pavers.

Thanks for dropping by.

                                                            Kathy

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P.S.—Gracie, this is for you: grow-bags galore!