Sunday, October 23, 2011

Stone Wall Complete!

Today I have a sore back and soaring spirits. Yesterday I finished THE WALL. I have been working on this wall for 4 1/2 years and it is now done measuring in at 587 feet long! I have built many, many stonewalls during my years here on Ashbee Hill but this is by far the longest. Here is the final end cap finished on Saturday, October 22, 2011.


It ends the same way it began - in a fairly plain Jane fashion but oh, the beauty in the details in between! Below is an end cap leading to a bar way with a rock that was just going to stay right where it was.


The wall makes a right angle turn at about the 300 foot point with half running east-west and half going north-south.


It has 3 tree circles - locations where I had to route the wall around trees that were in the way.


And six bar ways for walkers to pass through.



The project started in the spring of 2007 because I was cleaning up the edge of the back yard. That is where this particular wall starts.  There was an old wall there, never built as a wall but more as a pile of rock to clear the field. I started rebuilding. This project was more challenging than many of my walls because I was using the rock that was there - or more precisely just the "less than ideal" rock that was there. All good rock was being pulled and saved for important retaining walls down near the house. Here is the first section completed.


But then I just kept going. Here is a great shot of what the former wall looked like. I had to disassemble it before rebuilding.


I generally worked during the cool days of spring before the black flies arrived in May, then again in June until the deer ticks made working impossible. I didn't work during the hot summer months but would start up again as soon as the days started to cool in the fall and work until it was too cold. 

Watching the wall through all seasons has brought us much joy, even long before it was done.

Spring construction.......

It was so rewarding watch the green shoots start to appear all around me as I built.

Summer Sunshine....

Fall Foliage...

Winter White...



And then the winter of 2011 where we would ski right over the top of the wall.....


The wall borders an area we call "The Glade". Beautiful woodland grass grows naturally there and we have worked hard to clear the deadfall. We see it as a woodland garden, and we are building sculptures to populate it!

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©2011 Ashbee Design, Marji Roy








4 comments:

  1. I like the image with what looks like mist in the background. Two football fields long! Nice job.

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  2. I just LOVE your stone wall! Did you continue using rocks from around the area of your property or did you buy rocks to build it? I have another question too. Did you put it on your property line?

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  3. Oh my goodness, what a ton of work, but it certainly paid off! The wall looks absolutely spot on. Great work!!

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  4. You worked really hard and I admire your determination. We live in the mountains in North Arkansas and we have lots of natural rocks. I built a pretty good size rock flower bed and thought that was hard. But, your wall is awesome!

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