Sunday, May 16, 2010

Coping Hypothesis



I'd been keeping Nick up to date with the coping idea via picture messages from Ireland and he thought it was a go-er. Before we got started, we had a surprise visit from the newest addition to the Kaill walling crew - the super-cute PATMAN.



While we were messing about with Pat, Nick got started with the coping experiment. By the time I'd come up to join him, it was already taking shape beautifully.



Another landmark event - NO STRINGS ATTACHED - and the wall is still standing! Unfortunately there are no decent stones left to finish the final couple of courses on the left hand side, so we're going to need another trip to the quarry.


Thursday, May 13, 2010

Skull Harbour - Coping inspiration


During a week in and around the lovely Irish village of SKULL, there was plenty of walling to get inspiration from, even though they tend to use mortar, the lazy rascals!



About 90% of the walls around this corner of the emerald isle use a sort of double-faced coping which i'd not seen anywhere round the UK, it's giving me an idea though...



Looks great from the outside faces, shame they're always filled with concrete. I wonder why they don't plant them up?



Hello... High on the hill above the harbour, I finally found somebody who had got some alpine plants on the go in their gateposts. This is definitely going to work, the question is, can we get the double-faced coping to stay in place without the mortar?



On the lookout for some alpiney / trailing plants that would like to live in the wall.



I'm not sure what this stuff is, but it would look great trailing down the front of the wall.



More nice trailers.



Sweet. If anybody knows what any of these plants are, please let me know. Should really have taken some home with me.



This wall has the opposite effect of what i'm going for (bedding plants plopped into a concrete hole rather than alpine plants that look like they've found their way the wall naturally) - but i'm a sucker for pansies.