Building Stone Walls
by John Vivian

      Building Stone Walls shows you everything you need to know to build sturdy mortarless (dry-stacked) stone walls for landscaping. Learn how to make either free-standing stone walls or stone retaining walls, plus how to build a proper foundation. Coverage also includes: how to find good rock, how to build seats, steps and gates into a wall, and how to make a morterless stone birdbath, plus diversions or dams in a stream. Carefully detailed, clear drawings show the techniques to follow--and how to avoid problems. First published in 1976, the material covered in this book is just as timeless as stone itself. 108 pages. $12.00

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Stonework
Techniques and Projects
by Charles McRaven

      No building material rivals stone for beauty, permanence, and enduring popularity. Discover the lasting statisfaction of working with stone and learn the tricks of the trade from a master craftsman. Builder Charles McRaven offers the benefit of his fifty years of stonework experience in Stonework, a book that will inform, entertain and inspire anyone using or working with stone.

McRaven helps even first -time buiilders comprehend the intricacies of working with different stone types, including sandstone and quartzite, limestone, granite and greenstone, shale, slate and other stones. He covers how to choose the most suitable stone and where to locate natural or commercial sources of stone, including recycled stone, plus cutting and shaping stone and handling and safety issues

Featured projects include how to build a stone wall with and without mortar, plus curved walls, arches (with and without mortar), and using stone for gardens, paths, pools, waterfalls, landscape accents, pillars, gateways, doorways, stone steps, even bridges and entryways. 1997. 183 Pages. $19.00

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Building with Stone
by Charles McRaven

      Concrete and steel may weight as much, but nothing can rival stone for its beauty and durability. Building With Stone is an introduction to the art and craft of creating stone structures and projects by a man who has made stonework his vocation. In this book the author covers some similar techniques and projects as in his book Stonework: Techniques and Projects (see above), but he goes into greater depth with mortared wall systems and buttresses, detailing the traditional techniques of hand-layed stone for building anything from a barbecue pit to bridges, houses, or barns.

      Throughout the book is Charles McRaven's stonebuilding philosophy--that careful craftsmanship and time well spent during construction will repay itself many times over. The physical challneges will be offset by tremendous satisfaction and the knowledge that long after the builder is gone, the structure will continue to serve.

      Based on years of experience, this book will educate the novice and inspire the seasoned artisan. A stone builder at any level will learn how to evaluate each stone and undertake each step in the procedure with and eye toward aesthetics and useful permanence. The final chapter covers proper restoration techniques for stone structures. 1980, 1989. 192 Pages.

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Stone House
A Guide to Self-Building with Slipforms
by Tomm Stanley

      Born and raised in the USA, author Tomm Stanley hopped around the world working in Antarctica, Australia, southeast Asia and New Zealand, where he found a partner and settled down. Tomm and Sabrina had lots of rocks available on their land, and so slipforming was the obvious choice for building their dream home.

      The slipforming method they used is largely to early slipforming methods used in North America, with one significant improvement: Instead of wire ties to hold the forms together, Stanley ran threaded rod through plastic sleeves, and used wingnuts on the outside of the forms to tighten the forms. The plastic sleeves stayed in the wall, but the threaded rod could be used again and again.

      This book is most appropriate for builders in mild climates since Stanley used only the thermal mass of the walls to moderate hot and cold temperature extremes, much like adobe houses in the southwest. There is no insulation in the walls to moderate more extreme climates, such as here in frigid Montana.

      The author uses both Imperial and metric measurements in the book, which makes it useful to readers anywhere. More importantly, Stanley emphasizes a planning method where rooms are designed to utilize standard-size building materials without much cutting and fitting.

      Stanley has an informal dialogue style of writing, which includes his thoughts, philosophy and stories along the way. He includes coverage of passive solar principles for mild climates, plus how to make a house fit the landscape. Also included are sections on moulding and casting techniques, with some coverage of working with recycled windows and doors, plus paint stripping and wood finishing. Revised and expanded edition, 2009. ISBN: 978-0-473-14821-8. 200 pages.

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The Stonebuilder's Primer
A Step-by-Step Guide for Owner-Builders
by Charles Long

      "It must be more complicated than that." Is the frequently heard comment of visitors to the author's farmstead in rural Ontario. Setting out to create an aesthetically satisfying home of stone on a limited budget--and with no previous construction experience--Charles and Elizabeth Long not only succeeded in their efforts but developed a "compromise method" of stone construction that is both simpler and truer to the stonemason's art than the popular slipform method. Drawing upon his years of personal experienece, the author describes the complete building process in clear, easy-to-follow steps and, in so doing, dispels the myth of difficulty that surrounds stone construction. Fully illustrated with hundreds of diagrams and photographs. 1998. 126 Pages. $18.00.

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