Reprinted with permission from Delgado Stone.

When in the research stage of your home improvement project, it does not take long to discover a growing list of building material options, accompanied by an abundance of information and advice for each. There are many factors and considerations when it comes to selecting the right product. While we’re invested in the benefits of natural stone, we’re also committed to providing natural stone resources to further education in the industry. More education helps ease the process of finding the best fit for their style, taste, and budgets, and to suit their individual project needs. Here are five things to know when you decide on using natural stone for your home improvement project, to help ensure product satisfaction and an overall smooth experience.

Photo courtesy of Lurvey Supply.

1. Start with a trusted natural stone resource. Understanding natural stone and its attributes is a crucial starting point for a successful project and long-term satisfaction with your selections. You can start by researching natural stone from reputable sources, such as the Natural Stone Institute. With more than 2,000 members in over 50 countries worldwide, the Natural Stone Institute is a valuable resource in the building materials industry for natural stone education.
2. Know your overall goals. Envision the purpose you want your finished space to serve, and your overall goals for your project (for example: more efficient use of space, more appealing design, entertainment). Note the colors and patterns you’re drawn to, as well as the atmosphere you’re trying to create. Sometimes planning means ruling out things you do not want as you narrow down what fits your vision. This will help guide you toward the best products, collections, and options for your project, which takes the guesswork out and leads to a less overwhelming experience.
3. Choose your pattern. Natural stone has color and texture variations, which can also vary based on the pattern you choose. While this is part of the appeal of the natural look, you want to make sure you’re aware of the full-color range and possibilities ahead of receiving any materials. Looking at photos is helpful to inspire your imagination but take the opportunity to see the natural stone collections you’re considering in person so you can get an idea of how they might vary, what to expect, and how they might fit with your project (as well as blend with existing features). Two great ways to do this are visiting a showroom or receiving sample.
4. Give yourself enough time. Plan ahead and give yourself enough time to lay out the scope of your project, coordinate with your mason or fabricator’s schedule, and allow for product lead times. Lead times can vary seasonally and as demand changes; they also vary between different natural stone material options. For best results, and a more reliable timeline, be sure to manage expectations and coordinate accordingly.
5. Ask questions! Your designer, mason, or fabricator can be another excellent resource on natural stone and other building materials, and you’ll want to take full advantage of their expertise, experience, and advice! When discussing and seeing photos of past projects, you can learn from them what makes a project successful, what works and what doesn’t. You’ll also want to get their insight when it comes to how much material you need, which can vary depending on the chosen product.

When using natural stone, or any other building material for that matter, researching, planning, and making the most of available resources will ensure that your project runs as smoothly and successfully as possible, which is great for everyone involved.

Photo courtesy of Delgado Stone.

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Comparing the performance attributes of natural stone with manmade materials

Exterior Design

While design trends come and go, natural stone remains a timeless and flexible option for many exterior applications including cladding, paving, and hardscapes. This is due to the variety of natural stone types available that are beautiful, durable, and versatile. No wonder so many manmade materials try to emulate or replicate these characteristics and qualities.

It is important to know how the material chosen for an exterior project will perform under a variety of circumstances, conditions, and uses. It is also essential to understand how natural stone compares to manmade materials used for the same applications in order to select the material that will perform the best. At the same time, knowing how the material impacts the environment will ensure that you are choosing the most sustainable material for the application.

Photo courtesy of Connecticut Stone.

Performance Matters

A material’s optimal performance is based on a combination of the attributes of the material itself, how the material is installed, and the conditions to which it is exposed. There are many different issues to consider:

• How will the material hold up under freeze/thaw conditions? Continued cycles of freezing and thawing can cause some materials to degrade more quickly.
• Does it have good UV resistance and solar reflectance? Many materials will break down over time or change appearances when exposed to UV light.
• Does the material have a low absorption rate? Materials with lower absorption rates tend to be more stain resistant. Sealing a material can lower its absorption rate and improve its performance.
• Is the material slip-resistant? Slip resistance is the level of traction needed for a walking surface to remain safe for those using it. Slip resistance is impacted by the material’s texture and porosity, as well as any surface treatments used and elements it is exposed to, including water and dust.

Performance attributes should be addressed no matter what material you’re considering or what type of project you’re working on. These factors play an even more important role in sustainability and in the long-term performance of the material. Let’s examine how natural stone stacks up to manmade materials from the perspective of these performance objectives.

Photo courtesy of Gallegos.

Exterior Applications for Natural Stone versus Manmade Materials

Cladding and Veneer
The possibilities for natural stone cladding and veneer are endless. Limestone, granite, marble, travertine, basalt, slate, quartzite, and sandstone are among the many options. These stones are versatile, meaning they can be cut and finished into different shapes, textures, and patterns, creating a cohesive aesthetic. Many stones are durable in extreme weather conditions. When discussing vertical stone applications, the installation standards and techniques can make even vulnerable stones durable. Most stones have a long life span. Light colored stones have a high solar reflectance index, meaning they will reflect the sun well, reducing heat gain on the building or site. Stone also has a low embodied energy, an important consideration for sustainability requirements. This is because natural stone was created by the Earth and very little energy or additional resources are needed to quarry, fabricate, and finish it. Some stones are porous and may stain if subjected to contaminates over time. Depending on the stone’s mineral composition it may be susceptible to the effects of acid rain. Natural stone may sometimes have a higher initial cost than manmade materials, but it often proves to be the most cost-effective choice because it lasts so long. This is especially true because natural stone can also be refinished, repaired, restored, or recycled.

Manmade materials including porcelain, concrete, GFRC panels, metal, and terracotta are also options for exterior cladding.  Concrete and porcelain are durable and UV stable; good choices for the exterior and the exposure to sunlight and the elements they must withstand. However, these materials do not typically last as long as stone. Concrete, in the form of cast stone and cultured stone, is often tinted and can fade heavily from sunlight/UV exposure. Some manufacturers are improving the color fastness of cultured stone, but that adds chemicals and cost to the final product. Some manmade materials can also sometimes look flat since they are often made to be uniform in appearance and lack the natural veining and textures of natural stone. Most of them also have a high embodied energy because they require a wide range of other materials and energy intensive processes to be manufactured.

Paving
Natural stones including granite, sandstone, basalt, limestone, slate, travertine, marble, and porphyry are good options for paving. Again, one of the main performance aspects of using natural stone in this manner is its incredible durability. Surfaces can also be finished for slip-resistance and design options abound with more edging, pattern, surface texture, and color than manmade surfaces. Many natural stones perform very well in freeze/thaw environments and conditions. In some cases, natural stone will cost less than porcelain or concrete imitations. Once again, the low embodied energy of natural stone makes it a great option for meeting sustainability goals. The installation of natural stone may be more costly than some manmade materials and it may need to be sealed, depending on the type of stone, location, and environmental conditions. However, as mentioned previously, natural stone’s long life cycle makes it a very cost-effective choice.

Concrete, clay, and porcelain are among the manmade materials used for paving. A few of the pros of using these materials include the possibility of lower replacement and maintenance costs for concrete, and that porcelain is UV stable. There are limited texture options for concrete, which can contribute to a lower cost for the material. Quite often though, concrete fades and the material takes on a very aggregate-like appearance and will lose its color. New technologies are improving surface wear, color fastness, texture, and stain resistance. However, these add quite a bit to the cost and in some cases will make it more expensive than natural stone. For clay, the use of sand mold and wire cut production methods will yield a paver that has a high absorption rate and may have significant issues with salts and efflorescence. These pavers require a more costly installation process due to their larger sizing tolerance issues created by the moisture and firing process. There are pavers created with a compressed production process which perform better but still have performance issues and are not as durable as most natural stones.  High fired or vitrified clay pavers can be very hard and durable, but also very brittle. Porcelain behaves like glass and can also be very brittle, especially in a dry set application in a freeze thaw environment, so it will need to be set with spacers to protect itself in the winter. Porcelain has no absorption, so water will just sit on the surface. The water needs to evaporate or surface drain, so in the winter this can create a very slick surface and be dangerous. These products also have high embodied energy, which creates a negative impact on the environment.

Eden limestone dimensional flagstone. Photo courtesy of Lurvey Supply.

Natural Stone and Sustainability

Natural stone has demonstrated considerable durability in local and regional environments and applications. In many cases, these have lasted for hundreds of years, even millennia. Most manmade materials have not been around long enough to demonstrate that level of performance. The qualities of longevity and durability have proven that natural stone is also a great choice for meeting green building goals. The initial material and installation costs are offset by the long life expectancy and low maintenance requirements. Little to no cleaning or chemicals are required to maintain the material and as mentioned, natural stone can also be refinished, repaired, restored, or recycled. Natural stone is 100% natural. Engineered quartz, concrete, and porcelain require many different materials including chemicals to be manufactured and many of them are not recyclable.

So, as Oscar Wilde once said: “Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery that mediocrity can pay to greatness.” Choose natural stone and you will be contributing to the long legacy of great, high-performing, sustainable projects in the world.

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Precast concrete is a popular building material that is cast in a mold or form. This process is done off-site from a project to control the product quality and reduce waste. The material is used in both indoor and outdoor projects for wall panels, flooring, and even kitchen countertops. Gray is often the color choice for concrete products, but there are several color options available that are achieved through the use of dyes, pigments, and acid stains.

Some of the ingredients in precast concrete are natural materials, such as coarse and fine aggregates, cement, water, and admixtures. The concrete industry has made efforts to reduce their significant environmental impact by substituting some of these ingredients with fly ash, a byproduct of coal production. Because they are achieving a reduction in the embodied carbon with this strategy, they often market their products as “green.” There are a few sustainable characteristics to precast concrete including its thermal mass. The factory environment uses less material than concrete created on site and often the materials come from local sources, which can reduce transportation costs and emissions. However, as you can see from the manufacturing process outlined below, the multi-step and energy intensive processes involved in manufacturing precast concrete create a much larger environmental footprint than natural stone.

A precast concrete wall panel with a repeating pattern. Photo Credit: Wikimedia Commons/ Acabashi

Manufacturing Precast Concrete vs. Natural Stone

To manufacture precast concrete, raw materials are required to first make cement. Minerals are mined out of the ground and then transported to a cement manufacturer or plant. The minerals are heated at extremely high temperatures to create the cement which requires the use of a lot of energy and produces a significant amount of harmful emissions including sulfur dioxide, nitrogen oxide, and carbon monoxide. A mold and steel reinforcement are also needed for the precast concrete. The mold must be created and the steel must be acquired and transported to a steel manufacturer, where it is melted and cast into reinforcing rods. Aggregates are also required, which must be mined, crushed, and sorted. There are other additives and products required depending on the desired finish. The materials are mixed with water, put into molds, and cured into the final product. Polishing, sealing, and/or waxing may also be necessary, depending on the end use of the precast concrete.

In contrast, natural stone requires only quarrying, fabricating, finishing, and transporting. No additional materials or chemicals are required to create natural stone. The Earth naturally forms the material over time. This means natural stone really is a natural material and has many other attributes, including its durability, recyclability, and wide range of aesthetics. Natural stone can be used in many different indoor and outdoor applications as well and contains no Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs), meaning it does not emit any harmful gases, making it a healthy material.

Sustainability Concerns

From an overall sustainability perspective, natural stone has a lower environmental footprint than precast concrete. This is due to the minimal resources used to quarry, fabricate, finish, and transport natural stone.  As the graph below demonstrates, precast concrete has a higher global warming potential (GWP) than natural stone. Every step in the precast concrete manufacturing process requires the use of a lot of energy, which contributes to their total GWP. The larger the GWP, the more that a given gas warms the Earth compared to carbon dioxide (CO2) over the same timeframe. The natural stone industry is often criticized for utilizing raw materials that are not rapidly renewable. However, natural stone is abundant within the Earth. Other industries also utilize the supply of natural stone as it is a significant ingredient in concrete, porcelain, and other manmade products.

The impacts of these processes have been documented and systematically compared against other materials using the same environmental criteria. This information is a valuable resource when selecting a sustainable material for a project.

The embodied carbon quantities displayed were estimated based on the following:
Unite of Measure: Global Warming Potential (kg CO₂ eq)
Functional Unit: 1m²
Scope: Raw Material Extraction, Transportation, Manufacturing (A1-A3)
Natural Stone: Industry-Wide EPDs for Cladding, Flooring & Countertops
Pre-Cast Concrete Cladding: Industry-Wide EPD for Architectural Precast Panels, 150 lbs per ft3, 4” thick
Engineered Quartz: Average of three individual manufacturer EPDs
Terrazzo: Average of three individual manufacturer EPDs

These characteristics and attributes also make natural stone a great choice when seeking a green building rating certification within the U.S. Green Building Council’s Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) or the International Living Future Institute’s Living Building Challenge (LBC). The different manufacturing processes and impacts of building materials are being documented in product labels such as Environmental Product Declarations (EPDs) and Health Product Declarations (HPDs). These labels make it even easier to qualify for points and credits within LEED and other green building rating systems using natural stone. The labels document and quantify environmental information on the life cycle of a product and allow you to make comparisons and informed decisions on materials that fulfill the same function. The product labels are also intended to demonstrate that the health and environmental claims are transparent, accurate, and meet defined standards. Industry-wide EPDs are available for natural stone cladding, flooring/paving, and countertops. HPDs are available for common natural stone types used in the dimension stone industry including granite, limestone, marble, quartzite, onyx, sandstone, slate, travertine, and more.  (See also: Environmental and Health Product Labels for Natural Stone.)

To further advance these issues, the natural stone industry has been working diligently over the years to make continuous improvements in each area and step of the process. This includes reducing water use, energy use, improving the efficiency of the transportation of natural stone, properly managing and adaptively reusing quarry sites, and many others.

Technology advancements in the natural stone industry have led companies to create zero waste strategies that use every part of a stone block. Photo Credit: Coldspring

Stone wall designs can be quickly and easily fabricated using computer numerically controlled machinery, with any waste being used in stone byproducts. Photo Credit: Stephanie Vierra

The natural stone industry has created a certification system that determines if a quarry or fabricator meets defined sustainability standards in key areas of importance. This makes it easier to find and use natural stones that meet the standard, simplifying the process of choosing the right material that not only looks and performs well, but also has the least amount of impact on the environment. The standard is also accepted within the LBC, further ensuring its use in sustainable building projects. The metrics of the Natural Stone Sustainability Standard can be used to vet stone suppliers even if they have not yet achieved certification.  More information is available via the Natural Stone Institute or NSF International.

Manufacturing Impacts Series: Read More

Sintered surface, also known as ultra-compact surface, is an engineered product that is dense, durable, and resistant to stains, heat, and scratches. The material can be used in many different applications including interior kitchens and bathrooms, and exterior applications such as wall cladding and countertops. This is due to the material’s various thicknesses and durability, and because it has a low porosity and does not fade from UV exposure. The intended design gets printed on the surface but typically does not go all the way through the material. This means that the ends and edges may not have the same color or pattern as the rest of the surface. Sintered surface has an increased risk of chipping due to its denseness and hardness. The edges are especially prone to damage if impacted and can be difficult to repair.

Sintered surface is sometimes marketed as sustainable because it contains natural materials. But as you will see from the manufacturing process described below, the use of an energy intensive manufacturing process gives sintered surface a larger environmental footprint than natural stone.

A sintered stone slab with an interesting texture ready for use as a countertop. Photo Credit: Wikimedia Commons/JonSmith37341.

Manufacturing Sintered Surface vs. Natural Stone

Sintered surfaces are created with several natural materials including kaolin, feldspars, silico-aluminates, and clays, which are first mined out of the ground. The raw materials are then transported to a manufacturing plant, where they must then undergo a complex, energy intensive process that simulates, or mimics, hundreds of years of metamorphic change. To manufacture a sintered surface requires several different stages of processing including grinding, mixing, reacting, stabilizing, separating, and drying. This resulting mixture is then subjected to immense pressure and extreme heat—more than 2,000^o F—to fuse the materials together, all of which requires a lot of energy.

In contrast, natural stone requires only quarrying, fabricating, finishing, and transporting. No additive materials or chemicals are required to create natural stone. Stone is formed naturally by the Earth over time. Several types of natural stone, including marble and gneiss, undergo metamorphoses within the Earth’s crust where extreme pressure and heat transform the deposit from a more porous material to a harder and denser material. This process happens over millions of years in the ground. This means natural stone really is a natural material and has many other attributes, including its durability, recyclability, and wide range of aesthetics. Natural stone can be used in many different indoor and outdoor applications as well and contains no Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs), meaning it does not emit any harmful gases, making it a healthy material. 

Sustainability Concerns

From an overall sustainability perspective, natural stone has a lower environmental footprint than a sintered surface. This is due to the minimal resources used to quarry, fabricate, finish, and transport natural stone. Each step in the sintered surface manufacturing process requires the use of energy, which contributes to the total GWP. The larger the GWP, the more that a given gas warms the Earth compared to carbon dioxide (CO₂) over the same timeframe.

These characteristics and attributes also make natural stone a great choice when seeking a green building rating certification within the U.S. Green Building Council’s Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) or the International Living Future Institute’s Living Building Challenge (LBC). The different manufacturing processes and impacts of building materials are being documented in product labels such as Environmental Product Declarations (EPDs) and Health Product Declarations (HPDs). These labels make it even easier to qualify for points and credits within LEED and other green building rating systems using natural stone. The labels document and quantify environmental information on the life cycle of a product and allow you to make comparisons and informed decisions on materials that fulfill the same function. The product labels are also intended to demonstrate that the health and environmental claims are transparent, accurate, and meet defined standards. Industry-wide EPDs are available for natural stone cladding, flooring/paving, and countertops. HPDs are available for common natural stone types used in the dimension stone industry including granite, limestone, marble, quartzite, onyx, sandstone, slate, travertine, and more.  (See also: Environmental and Health Product Labels for Natural Stone.)

To further advance these issues, the natural stone industry has been working diligently over the years to make continuous improvements in each area and step of the process. This includes reducing water use, energy use, improving the efficiency of the transportation of natural stone, properly managing and adaptively reusing quarry sites, and many others.

An example of a stone fabrication plant recycling and reusing water in the polishing stage, saving thousands of gallons of water annually. Photo Credit: Dennett Tile & Stone

The natural stone industry has created a certification system that determines if a quarry or fabricator meets defined sustainability standards in key areas of importance. This makes it easier to find and use natural stones that meet the standard, simplifying the process of choosing the right material that not only looks and performs well, but also has the least amount of impact on the environment. The standard is also accepted within the LBC, further ensuring its use in sustainable building projects. The metrics of the Natural Stone Sustainability Standard can be used to vet stone suppliers even if they have not yet achieved certification.  More information is available via the Natural Stone Institute or NSF International.

Manufacturing Impacts Series: Read More

Porcelain is a hardwearing material that is suitable for both indoor and outdoor design projects. Porcelain slabs or tile are often used for kitchen and bathroom counters, flooring, stairs, and windowsills. It is a fairly thin material, typically manufactured to be only ½” thick. The basic ingredients that go into the process of manufacturing porcelain are clays, sands, and different feldspar minerals. Because it contains some natural materials, porcelain is often marketed as a sustainable material. Porcelain is also produced to emulate the beauty and veining of marble. But as you will see from the manufacturing process outlined below, the use of many materials and additives and the energy intensive processes involved in its manufacturing create a larger environmental footprint for porcelain than natural stone.

Manufacturing Porcelain vs. Natural Stone

Raw materials like clay, feldspar, and other materials must first be mined out of the ground and then transported to a manufacturing plant. The next step in the process is the intake, storage, and sorting of the required raw materials. Additives such as inks and glazes must also be transported to the manufacturing plant, where they undergo further sorting, mixing, forming, drying, and pressing. Images and glazes are applied to the porcelain surface at this stage. Then, extreme heat is required to fire and glaze the materials into the final porcelain product.

Manufacturing impacts of porcelain.

In contrast, natural stone requires only quarrying, fabricating, finishing, and transporting.  No additional materials or chemicals are required to create natural stone. The Earth naturally forms the material over time.  This means natural stone really is a natural material and has many other attributes, including its durability, recyclability, and wide range of aesthetics. Natural stone can be used in many different indoor and outdoor applications as well and contains no Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs), meaning it does not emit any harmful gases, making it a healthy material.

Manufacturing impacts of natural stone.

Sustainability Concerns

From an overall sustainability perspective, natural stone has a lower environmental footprint than porcelain due to the minimal resources used to quarry, fabricate, finish, and transport it.  All of the steps in the manufacturing process of porcelain require the use of a lot of water and energy which contribute to the total GWP. The larger the GWP, the more that a given gas warms the Earth compared to CO₂ over that same timeframe.

These characteristics and attributes also make natural stone a great choice when seeking a green building rating certification within the U.S. Green Building Council’s Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) or the International Living Future Institute’s Living Building Challenge (LBC). The different manufacturing processes and impacts of building materials are being documented in product labels such as Environmental Product Declarations (EPDs) and Health Product Declarations (HPDs). These labels make it even easier to qualify for points and credits within LEED and other green building rating systems using natural stone. The labels document and quantify environmental information on the life cycle of a product and allow you to make comparisons and informed decisions on materials that fulfill the same function. The product labels are also intended to demonstrate that the health and environmental claims are transparent, accurate, and meet defined standards. Industry-wide EPDs are available for natural stone cladding, flooring/paving, and countertops. HPDs are available for common natural stone types used in the dimension stone industry including granite, limestone, marble, quartzite, onyx, sandstone, slate, travertine, and more.  (See also: Environmental and Health Product Labels for Natural Stone.)

To further advance these issues, the natural stone industry has been working diligently over the years to make continuous improvements in each area and step of the production process. This includes reducing water use, energy use, improving the efficiency of the transportation of natural stone, properly managing and adaptively reusing quarry sites, and many others.

Halibut Point State Park in Massachusetts is a former granite quarry reclaimed into a public park. Photo courtesy of Mass.gov.

The natural stone industry has created a certification system that determines if a quarry or fabricator meets defined sustainability standards in key areas of importance. This makes it easier to find and use natural stones that meet the standard, simplifying the process of choosing the right material that not only looks and performs well, but also has the least amount of impact on the environment. The standard is also accepted within the LBC, further ensuring its use in sustainable building projects.  Even if a natural stone is not yet certified to the standard, the information can be used to vet stone suppliers and ask important questions to help choose the optimal natural stone for your project. More information is available via the Natural Stone Institute or NSF International.

Manufacturing Impacts Series: Read More

There are many building materials to choose from when designing or remodeling a project.  Engineered quartz is one material that is often used in interior projects, especially for countertops. It comes in a variety of colors, patterns, and textures. The product is made by combining natural and manmade materials including quartz, resins, pigments, and other ingredients.  It is a hard, dense, and nonporous material but can only be used on interiors because the resins are not UV stable for outdoor use. Engineered quartz is often manufactured to mimic popular natural stones, especially white marble, but tends to have less variation or veining than natural stone. Engineered quartz is sometimes marketed as a sustainable, natural material because of the quartz in it. However, as the process of manufacturing engineered quartz below demonstrates, that is not the case.

Manufacturing Process for Engineered Quartz

The manufacturing process for engineered quartz includes many energy and resource intensive steps, resulting in a greater impact on the environment. First, quartz is quarried or mined out of the ground, then crushed. Several other additives are required, such as polyesters, resins, acids, alcohols, styrene, peroxide, and other chemicals to create a series of chemical reactions. These additive materials all have to be manufactured and then transported to a manufacturing plant where they will be mixed and put into molds, compacted, and often heated and cured to create slabs. Depending on the manufacturer, the resulting slabs will vary in size, thickness, and appearance. Since engineered quartz is manufactured and installed in slabs, the seams will be visible in a large countertop application. Also, while engineered quartz is manufactured to be somewhat heat resistant, it is not as heat resistant as natural stone. For example, it cannot be used as flooring over radiant heat because of possible damage from the long-term heat exposure.

Manufacturing impacts of engineered quartz.

Sustainability Concerns

Comparatively, natural stone can be used in most applications and requires only quarrying, fabricating, finishing, and transporting. No additional materials or chemicals are required to create natural stone. The Earth naturally forms the material over time. This means natural stone really is a natural material and has many other attributes, including its wide range of aesthetics, durability, and recyclability. Natural stone contains no Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs), meaning it does not emit any harmful gases, making it a healthy material.

Manufacturing impacts of natural stone.

The materials used and the multi-step process required to manufacture engineered quartz also result in a higher global warming potential, as shown below. From an overall sustainability perspective, natural stone has a lower environmental footprint than engineered quartz due to the minimal resources used to quarry, fabricate, fabricate, finish, and transport it. The impacts of these processes have been documented and systematically compared against other materials using the same environmental criteria. This information is a valuable resource when selecting a sustainable material for a project.

Global Warming Potential

The embodied carbon quantities displayed were estimated based on the following:
Unite of Measure: Global Warming Potential (kg CO₂ eq)
Functional Unit: 1m²
Scope: Raw Material Extraction, Transportation, Manufacturing (A1-A3)
Natural Stone: Industry-Wide EPDs for Cladding, Flooring & Countertops
Pre-Cast Concrete Cladding: Industry-Wide EPD for Architectural Precast Panels, 150 lbs per ft3, 4” thick
Engineered Quartz: Average of three individual manufacturer EPDs
Terrazzo: Average of three individual manufacturer EPDs

These characteristics and attributes also make natural stone a great choice when seeking a green building rating certification within the U.S. Green Building Council’s Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) or the International Living Future Institute’s Living Building Challenge (LBC). The different manufacturing processes and impacts of building materials are being documented in product labels such as Environmental Product Declarations (EPDs) and Health Product Declarations (HPDs). These labels make it even easier to qualify for points and credits within LEED and other green building rating systems using natural stone. The labels document and quantify environmental information on the life cycle of a product and allow you to make comparisons and informed decisions on materials that fulfill the same function. The product labels are also intended to demonstrate that the health and environmental claims are transparent, accurate, and meet defined standards. Industry-wide EPDs are available for natural stone cladding, flooring/paving, and countertops. HPDs are available for common natural stone types used in the dimension stone industry including granite, limestone, marble, quartzite, onyx, sandstone, slate, travertine, and more.  (See also: Environmental and Health Product Labels for Natural Stone.)

To further advance these issues, the natural stone industry has been working diligently over the years to make continuous improvements in each area and step of the process. This includes reducing water use, energy use, improving the efficiency of the transportation of natural stone, properly managing and adaptively reusing quarry sites, and many others.

The natural stone industry also created a certification system that determines if a quarry or fabricator meets defined sustainability standards in key areas of importance. This makes it easier to find and use natural stones that meet the standard, simplifying the process of choosing the right material that not only looks and performs well, but also has the least amount of impact on the environment. The standard is also accepted within the LBC, further ensuring its use in sustainable building projects. Even if a natural stone is not yet certified to the standard, the information can be used to vet stone suppliers and ask important questions to help choose the optimal natural stone for your project. For more information, see the Natural Stone Institute’s website at: www.naturalstoneinstitute.org/sustainability.

Manufacturing Impacts Series: Read More

Featured image: Riverside Roundabout, Los Angeles, CA. Reprinted with permission from Coldspring. 

These days, many project owners are looking to achieve as much value as possible out of their ventures. And one of the best ways to maximize a project’s value is by specifying an enduring, durable, and high-performance product like natural stone. When you select and specify stone to maximize the material’s benefits, you’ll bring your vision to life while providing owners with an environmentally sustainable solution that meets their needs. Here, we identify several of the best opportunities to add value to your next landscape project with natural stone.

Denver Union Station’s Wynkoop Plaza utilizes four different types of granite and is LEED Gold certified.

Take advantage of advanced stone manufacturing technology

Computer Numerical Control (CNC) technology has made its mark on stone design and fabrication, providing numerous benefits to those who take advantage of its capabilities. The CNC process enables highly-efficient manufacturing of some of the most creative designs imaginable. Through CNC manufacturing, designs are now possible that would have once been thought impossible or too costly to achieve.

Some typical applications for CNC technology include:

• Complex fountain or water feature designs
• Sculptural, artistic elements
• Radial or ramp and twist pieces
• Intricate landscape pavers

  

Maximize the stone’s usage through multiple finishes

By selecting multiple finishes of the same stone, designers can create variety without having to introduce a new material into the project. When different finishes are applied to a stone, a range of new tones and shades – varying from light to dark or muted to bold — are produced. The project site also remains unified through the use of one consistent material.

Designers may choose to change the stone’s finish to bring out different color tones on a project or to add a desired functionality at the site, such as delineating traffic within a paved area. The ability to change a stone’s shade and tone isn’t limited to only granite—most stones can be treated with various finishes to achieve different shades and functions.

The example below shows how different one stone can look when different finishes are applied to the same stone—in this case, Carnelian granite.

Specify for Sustainability

Natural stone adds value to any project through its sustainability properties. Stone—a single-ingredient product — is one of the most sustainable building materials that can be specified. Unlike alternative products, natural stone isn’t ground into a powder and combined with other resins, polymers, pigments, or chemicals to create a new product. In essence, a project that uses stone is simply borrowing it from the earth. At the end of its long life cycle, stone can be returned to the earth where it began.

2017 Pinnacle Award of Excellence: Boston, MA Children’s Hospital. Long-term maintenance of Mesabi Black granite, ANSI/NSC373 certified stone, is minimal.

When it comes to manufacturing processes for natural stone, the stone industry’s sustainability certification program allows stone suppliers and manufacturers to prove through third-party verification that their practices are environmentally responsible. To achieve certification, the natural stone company verifies that its extraction, manufacturing, and supply chain adhere to ethical standards.

By specifying this certified stone, you can ensure you are utilizing natural products with a sustainable and ethical supply chain on your project. The sustainability standard can also help projects meet sustainability goals, as the Sustainable Production of Natural Dimension Stone certification aligns with leading green building certifications, such as LEED v.4 and the Living Building Challenge.

Partner with a reliable stone source

Finally, an experienced partner and trusted natural stone supplier can help you find value and maximize your project’s budget. With a reliable stone source, you can count on projects to remain on schedule, without costly delays in shipping or manufacturing time.

As you consider a trusted partner, be sure to ask good questions. Do they have the capabilities and experience to work on the project? Have they shown you project examples to demonstrate their expertise? Do they offer tours of their quarry and manufacturing operations? These questions will help you begin the process of determining which partner is the right one for your project.

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An earlier version of this article appeared in the September 2020 edition of The Slippery Rock Gazette. Reprinted with permission. Photos courtesy of Chris Miller and assigned copyright holders.

If you’ve ever explored the beauty and charm of small-town Vermont, chances are you’ve visited Vermont’s state capital, Montpelier. Located just a stone’s throw from Montpelier is the town of Calais, the home of the Kent Museum and the Robinson Saw Mill. It’s also the home of the renowned Chris Miller Studio.

Chris Miller is a seasoned veteran with hammer and chisel who has been creating art since childhood and sculpture since 1976. Mostly self-taught, Chris was influenced by many local artists, including the late Billy Brauer of Warren, Vermont, and the late Lothar Werslin of Sandgate, Vermont. It’s noteworthy to mention that Chris’ studio is conveniently close to the Rock of Ages Quarry in Barre, Vermont, an area known as the “Granite Center of the World” for well over a century. Chris loves the granite from this area. Ask him about Barre granite and he’ll readily tell you why he loves it.

Lessons Learned, Experience Earned

Chris opened his first studio at age eighteen, exclusively doing wood sculpture. However, he soon turned to natural stone. “I had always wanted to try stone, and a few years after opening the studio I went to visit the Vermont quarries. What’s the old saying: ‘When in Rome, do as the Romans’? So, after many years of doing exclusively wood, it was nice to try a different material and the techniques used to carve it, and it was a great mid-career challenge to add stone to the mix. There’s also a lot more work in the stone-sculpture world than in the wood-sculpture world.”

Chris has an extensive wood working and carving room in his barn, as well as an area for stone, but is only set up to work on projects up to about one ton. When doing larger scale work, he uses two different studios in Barre that he rents, he explained.

“For the big projects, there are forklifts, bridge cranes, saws, sandblasting, and all the great stuff needed. I tend to work big when I can, and having these tools is pretty wonderful. Because of my back, I try not to work on anything small anymore, because if it’s a hundred pounds or less, I tend to pick it up and move it! When I’m working in Barre, if it’s six, ten or twenty tons, I just wave the crane guy over and it gets moved.”

Chris works with both granite and marble. “I do much, much more granite than marble just because granite is much more durable, and there are more applications. If it’s an indoor figurative thing, marble is really good for that, but if it’s going to be outdoors for years and years, you’re going to want it to be granite. Both soft and hard stones have their qualities just like soft and hard wood. With hard wood you can do finer details better, and with soft wood you can move a lot faster. It’s the same with stone. Some people will suggest the idea for a sculpture, and I’ll know immediately if it should be in granite or marble, because each material also lends itself better to different subject matter. It’s also nice to go from granite to marble to wood and back again, just for a feeling of variety.”

It’s all about finding the right stone for the right project. “I use different stones for different projects, but I’m a big fan of Barre Gray granite, especially the dark gray. The grain is tight, it’s predictable, and it carves really well. Some of the softer granites are more difficult to carve, whereas some dark granites have larger grain and bigger pieces of quartz or feldspar. They are beautiful to look at when they are polished, and when used in carvings that have a broader form, these colors can work out very well. But when you’re carving something with a lot of detail, the colors and patterns can compete with the design. If you’re carving a face or something with fine detail, you don’t want the stone to compete with the design you are working on.”

Know Your Client’s Needs, Understand Your Market

Vermont has a program called Art in State Buildings that’s promoted by the Vermont Arts Council. Each year they grant several commissions for any number of buildings that the state is constructing. Six years ago, Chris was a team leader for one of these commissions and put together a group of four sculptors for a project in the Vermont Psychiatric Care Hospital. “We wanted to design something that would interact with a very vulnerable psychiatric population in the hospital, so we designed all these therapy animal sculptures, and put them throughout the hospital. We did seven, and from what I heard later on from the staff there, the patients had formed relationships with the animals, and it had a really big impact on them.”

Chris’s clients vary. “I’ll go from doing a public piece, to a collector, to a private commission, to a commercial job. Over the last six years, my work has been divided between museums, commercial work, the Vermont State House, small public sculptures, commissions for private collections and private sculpture parks. It runs the whole spectrum. It’s important to know who you are dealing with. The client can be an individual commissioning the sculpture for themselves, or for a gift, or for a commercial project or for an institution, where you are dealing with a committee. You have to know your audience, and you have to know the cost and know if they can afford it. So I listen intently, find out what the budget is, what their needs are, what’s important, and what the sculpture needs to do. All these things matter.

“After this initial process, I’ll have a basic concept, and I’ll then work with sketches and go back and forth with renditions. When approved, I then make a small sketch in clay (a little maquette), and when that’s approved, I make a scale model. Once they approve that, I make a mold cast in plaster, so I have a hard model to work from. Then, finally, when I’m ready to start carving, it’s a matter of measuring and enlarging from the model. So as far as imagining what the form is going to look like in the stone, all that work was done during the preliminary modeling.”

Chris enjoys the physicality of his work. “Being a sculptor is physically difficult, and why I enjoy my trade, says the guy with three back surgeries. Right now I’ve just completed a project in Georgia. It’s a truck made out of fieldstone, and there was a lot of lifting and hammering, but these trucks are a lot of fun to make. I get really solid reactions when people see them. It’s funny, I can do a beautiful statue, and people are really in awe, but I do a stone truck, and it really draws attention. So I tend to like that whimsical stuff. It goes over really well with a wide audience, and there’s no reason that it can’t be whimsical and crafted well at the same time. I do a fair amount of serious sculpture, too, but I do a lot more whimsical things, like the world’s largest granite zipper that’s displayed in Barre. I also love to do figurative work, and I’ve done six larger than life hands. I like using hands as a subject, because they can express quite a bit. You can express strength, gentleness and emotion with a hand, just as any kind of figurative work. I just really like hands.”

The Challenge of Working in Stone

“I’ve come to realize over the years, that when doing this kind of work you have to do a lot of designing and planning. Fortunately, this fits really well into my personality, because I enjoy problem solving. When somebody comes to me with an idea for a sculpture and there are parts of the idea that seem impossible, I sometimes think, how am I possibly going to do this? But I love the process of imagining a way to do this, and then having that idea rejected, and then having another idea and another idea and another idea, and by the end, I’ve taken the problem and challenges in the design and worked them out.”

Each project is like a new puzzle to solve. “The logistics of it, the practicality about how you are going to go about things and taking into consideration the parts that can break… there are so many different layers that have to work together, and that kind of challenge is incredibly fun, and fits the way my mind works. For example: at a recent remote job in Georgia, doing a project like this involved figuring out the tools I’d need, the materials, renting the equipment, coordinating the deliveries and putting a tent around it. It’s like being a contractor of a large-scale project, and I love this part of the job! When it’s a large sculpture project, with the design, the committees, the subcontractors and lots of moving parts, the design management of this is incredibly enjoyable, just because it makes me use my resources, and I find that really, really fun.”

When asked what a sculptor like Michelangelo might think of his work if he was alive today, Miller said, “He’d probably think I’m a hack! However, he might appreciate that I usually do all the work myself. In his era, the sculptor would design the model for it, and then there would be a team of specialist carvers: somebody who works on drapery, somebody who works on heads, somebody who works on hair and somebody who works on hands. There was a team, and that was the tradition.”

Chris enjoys the entire process. “I like the designing, making the model, roughing it out, the finish work and the installation. People think I’m crazy for wanting to do all of the process by myself. With his students and studio helpers, that’s how Michelangelo could produce hundreds of sculptures in his lifetime, and why I can’t, working by myself. Nevertheless, I’m going to keep doing this as long as I can. I figure I’ve got about another decade that I can swing a hammer. I’m sixty-two and never want to retire, but do want to go to a nine month per year work schedule, making larger public sculptures.”

When asked if he had any advice for up-and-coming stone artists, Miller said: “The thing to do when starting out is to make designs that you want to earn commissions for in the future, because when you’re starting out, you are going to make things on speculation, and if you want to be known as a figurative artist, you need to make figurative work.

“If you’re heading in the direction of public art, you need to do sculpture that would be suitable for public art. That way you can build up your portfolio while doing it with an eye on the future. Commissions are often awarded to sculptors who have a track record of public work. So, if you’ve done something suitable for a public piece, take a photograph of it, Photoshop it into a picture of a public square, and when you answer the call for artists, you can truthfully say, ‘this is a piece that I designed for a public setting.’ So do the kind of sculpture that you want to do to get orders for the future and build up your portfolio.”

To view Chris’s outstanding work, visit his website at www.chrismillerstudio.com.

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