About the service
I engrave stone for houses and gardens: house numbers with the street name, waymarkers to the front door and to the bathhouse, small stones with plant names for the beds, and a short family line set by the entrance. Let me say the main thing straight away: I do not work on memorials or funerary pieces of any kind — I make garden and house signs, waymarkers and stones with plant names, and nothing else. The job starts with the blank. River and sea pebbles are good for their rounded shape and because they can simply be laid on the soil beside a plant; sawn flagstone gives a flat field and holds a small typeface better than anything; slate is handsome along its layered edge, but the layers sometimes flake, so on slate I set the letter larger and cut no thin serifs. Before anything else I photograph several blanks and send them over, because the shape of the stone decides half the result and that choice is yours to make.
Next I grind the panel where the lettering will sit: the weathered skin comes off and the surface is brought true, so the letter lies flat instead of diving into a hollow. On that ground face I lay out the line and fix the stencil — first the words are placed in position so we can look at the margins and the line breaks, and only then is anything held down. I pick the depth of the cut so the inscription reads in raking light: shallow engraving on grey stone simply vanishes at midday and the sign has to be hunted for. The letters can then be filled with exterior paint, or left as clean relief — relief never fades and needs no touching up, while paint reads from the gate. The edge gets a chamfer so there is no sharp flake under the hand.
Stone dust is dangerous to the lungs, so I cut only with water fed to the tool or under extraction, and always in a respirator; that costs a little speed and saves a great deal else. Please send your text already proofread: a cut letter cannot be put back, the only correction is a new blank, which means new dates and a new price. A heavy stone going on a wall is hung on anchors rated well above its weight, and beside a path I never set a stone where someone could trip over it — either off to one side, or flush with the ground.
What I do:
— house numbers with the street name on flagstone or pebble;
— waymarkers to the house, the bathhouse, the well and the gate;
— plant name labels for the garden and the vegetable beds;
— a family inscription on a stone by the entrance;
— fixing to a wall on anchors, on a pin driven into the ground, or the stone laid loose;
— chamfered and dressed edges, paint filling or clean relief;
— photographs of blanks to choose from before any cutting begins.
Next I grind the panel where the lettering will sit: the weathered skin comes off and the surface is brought true, so the letter lies flat instead of diving into a hollow. On that ground face I lay out the line and fix the stencil — first the words are placed in position so we can look at the margins and the line breaks, and only then is anything held down. I pick the depth of the cut so the inscription reads in raking light: shallow engraving on grey stone simply vanishes at midday and the sign has to be hunted for. The letters can then be filled with exterior paint, or left as clean relief — relief never fades and needs no touching up, while paint reads from the gate. The edge gets a chamfer so there is no sharp flake under the hand.
Stone dust is dangerous to the lungs, so I cut only with water fed to the tool or under extraction, and always in a respirator; that costs a little speed and saves a great deal else. Please send your text already proofread: a cut letter cannot be put back, the only correction is a new blank, which means new dates and a new price. A heavy stone going on a wall is hung on anchors rated well above its weight, and beside a path I never set a stone where someone could trip over it — either off to one side, or flush with the ground.
What I do:
— house numbers with the street name on flagstone or pebble;
— waymarkers to the house, the bathhouse, the well and the gate;
— plant name labels for the garden and the vegetable beds;
— a family inscription on a stone by the entrance;
— fixing to a wall on anchors, on a pin driven into the ground, or the stone laid loose;
— chamfered and dressed edges, paint filling or clean relief;
— photographs of blanks to choose from before any cutting begins.
