Like both a time-honored design or a modern one, the walkway leads the guests to thoroughly every corner of your house or palace, through the garden, the lawn yard. An eye-catching flagstone walkway is the first point to attract anyone who visits your landscape garden. Due to the appealing natural look, as well as its color, texture, the flagstone embellishes your home entrance in terms of creating a warm landscape, welcoming everyone come to your property.
Keep reading and we’re going to discuss more deeply a flagstone walkway, includes its benefits, appealing ideas, flagstone installation costs on average in 2021, and how to create a beautiful flagstone walkway for your family. You should first know that the flagstone walkway is adapted to any space and it’s really worth developing your path with flagstones right after you know their attraction to your landscaping!
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TABLE OF CONTENTS
- What is flagstone?
- Why should I create a flagstone walkway?
- Flagstone walkway design ideas
- Choose stones for your flagstone path
- How to install a flagstone walkway
- Cost of flagstones installation
I. WHAT IS FLAGSTONE?
There are many common types of stones you can consider when working with your walkway: flagstone, sandstone, granite, marble, etc. In this article, you’ll want to know about the flagstone, which originally belong to the stone group called “Sedimentary stone“. All stones which belong to this group are made from the hardened sedimentary layouts of sand under high pressure and low heat of water level.
Flagstone patios had appeared since the 1990s and most of the flagstone at that time was made from sand. Because there’s a long time to test sandstones, many constructors realized that soft flagstone has degraded so rapidly that the walkway couldn’t resist frigid climates and required a lot of effort for maintenance, particularly the stones in your swimming pool deck or patio. Therefore, flagstones these days have been replaced by harder materials such as quartzite, which is more greatly resistant to frigid climates and chemical damage and provides a nonslip textured surface.
Flagstone has been developed with its material along with a color spectrum that varies from white, brown, beige, green to gray. You can design different choices for the path ideas of your home garden. Flagstone also provides a dry walkway for anyone to easily take a step because of its feature of permeable and absorbing water.
II. WHY SHOULD I CREATE A FLAGSTONE WALKWAY?
It’s far from easy to find anything else better than a flagstone walkway for your landscaping. As we discussed above, the flagstone walkway these days provides homeowners so many conveniences that many constructors indicate it’s worth spending money and time to build a flagstone walkway for every landscape. These main following conveniences will help you for reference:
- Creating an elegant landscape with natural-looking from both stones and plants
- Uncomplicated to construct and immediately beautify your landscape.
- Its variety of available textures, colors, and sizes satisfies different demands of each person
- Offering the easiest ways to other areas of your house by connecting the path to each corner of the garden, backyard, garage, etc.
- Providing a high-quality walkway with a non-slip and permeable surface to avoid fall accidents.
- Resistant to wear and tear from significant damage, especially from chemicals such as the swimming pool’s chlorinated
- Walkway with durable materials requires less effort to maintain its original landscape.
- Alternatives with choices of having landscaping fabric covered the space between stones.
III. FLAGSTONE WALKWAY DESIGN IDEAS
At first, you should plan your ideas about the walkway before making any physical works. Depending on the designs and themes of your house and garden, you can make a formal or informal design for your own flagstone walkway. For formal designs, install the flagstone walkway with a straight layer, and with a curved layer for informal designs. A flagstone path can be installed in concrete, gravel, or sand foundation with different costs.
For reference, read the following flagstone walkway design options to gain the best idea for yourself.
Straight layout
In this way of flagstone walkway design, each stone will be cut in a rectangular or square pattern which makes the flagstone looks more elegant. All flagstones then will be installed in a straight line and give you formal feelings for your home space.
The curved or bent layout
A curved layout of the flagstone walkway will bring a natural appearance from the entrance to the main parts of your house, warmly entice the visitors to an attractive path. With random shapes and colors of the flagstone, which is determined in every edge of stones followed the curve of your path, results in such a more casual look and informal than the former.
Irregular Stones
Flagstones can have a powerful impact on their natural shape without any man-made influence. Between the spaces of stones, you can place the ground cover far apart to bring a greeting natural walkway.
Mortared flagstone
Mortared flagstone results from the mixture of sand, water, and cement which provides a smooth surface for your flagstone path.
Dry laid
Concrete gravel and sand had decomposed and created the flagstone which is dried laid and formed a tough base for stones. This design is totally relevant to homeowners with the desire for a friendly budget for flagstone walkway installation.
IV. CHOOSE STONES FOR YOUR FLAGSTONE PATH
Natural flagstone pathways are an excellent method to create welcome walks in a lovely setting. Flagstones are rocks that have been carved into irregular flag-like forms after being broken into slabs. Flagstones come in a variety of thicknesses, ranging from 1/4 to 2 inches (3 to 5 cm.) thick, depending on the application. They may also be obtained in a variety of color variants and rock kinds, such as bluestone, limestone, or sandstone, to readily fit the surrounding landscape design.
These are some of the several types of flagstone that you can prefer:
- Sandstone: This is a sandy stone formed by sand levels. They feature color patterns that are gentle pastels and span from red to beige. Furthermore, they are cooler in the summer, more lasting in most situations, and incredibly affordable. Though they are prone to absorbing water, they are not long-lasting in cold areas, and certain hues may be flaky and soft.
- Bluestone: This stone has a blue-green sandstone hue and is denser than other stones. You must seal and maintain its color, as well as shield it from scratches or stains.
- Limestone: This is a calcite stone that is light in color. It is a naturally divided surface that can be polished. It is also commonly found in creams, beiges, and greys. This stone is both long-lasting and weather-resistant. It is, however, difficult to transport and prone to acid.
- Quartzite: It features mica or silver speckles and is typically a mix of gold or gray. They are extremely durable, can withstand freezing temperatures, are resistant to damage, are chemical resistant, and have a non-slip surface.
- Slate: Slate walkway is a colorful metamorphic rock. Furthermore, it is simple to mold and mold, making it ideal for flooring and wall cladding. Although it is easily shatterable, it must be sealed to achieve shine and stain resistance.
V. HOW TO INSTALL A FLAGSTONE WALKWAY
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Step 1: Plan the ideas
First and foremost, you need to plan the design for your flagstone walkway ideas. Don’t jump to digging any area in your garden up first unless you want to regret it later. You need to decide which appearance you want for the entrance. A formal or informal design? Whether the ideas you have are relevant to your landscaping theme? A curved or straight layout is your favorite?
Step 2: Measure the walkway
Then, use the strings to measure all dimensions of your walkway and then using a garden hose to draft the shape of your path. Repeat this process to ensure keeping the width unchanged before laying down the garden hose. Next, use stakes to mark off the sign you established. In case you want a curved layout, spray your landscaping path instead of using a stake.
Step 3: Dig out the soil
Check whether there are any underground utility lines before going to the next step. Although you’ll not expect to dig deep into the soil, it’s still better to make sure you won’t cut any lines of your area. Then dig up the soil from 6 to 8 inches and keep the trench as even as possible. You may leave it slightly slope to drainage, but rather not an excessively sloped area.
Tamp down the excavated soil with a set of sand, gravel, and tamping. You can like to apply a layer of landscaping fabric to the excavated area, depending on your choice. If you do, place sand on the top of the landscaping fabric to cover fully your walkway.
STEP 4: LAY THE STONES
In case there is a curved walkway, you may need to cut the flagstone first to fit the shape of your path. Use chark or pencil, which is easy to erase, to draw the cut lines on the stones. Using the sledgehammer to tap the chisel and break the flagstone along the cut line.
You’ll need to place the large flagstones in the middle of the walkway first and make the adjustment if necessary. Then, put other stones around the largest ones and remain about 1 – 2 inches of spaces between flagstones. To test the uneven and tough level of your flagstone walkway, just walk above them. Use a rubber mallet to make your flagstone fixed.
Step 5: Fill the gaps
You’ll find some common ways to fill the gaps of your flagstone walkway. First, you can try to water your flagstone path and let the stones dry when applying them to your walkway. Or you can try to use mortar between them as everyone does in every work of building.
VI. COST OF FLAGSTONES INSTALLATION
The overall cost of any flagstone paving job will be represented in terms of price per square foot installed. These costs can be massaged upwards or downwards depending on the type of flagstone and where it originates from, and the cost of the stone alone is typically 3 – 4 dollars per square meter.
Formal flagstone stairs are straight, but informal versions have subtle bends and curves. In addition, you must select how you intend to build a flagstone walk. Despite the fact that it is more durable, placing flagstones in concrete is difficult and expensive. Nonetheless, flagstone walkways are often simply and inexpensively installed on a gravel and sand substrate.
These are factors that affecting flagstone prices:
- Some flagstone is very expensive because it is quite hard to get or has a limited supply.
- Long-distance shipping of flagstone might be more expensive owing to gasoline expenditures. Bluestone mined in Connecticut, for example, will be very expensive to export to California since it must be transported across the whole continent. With growing fuel prices, this becomes a larger portion of the installation price.
- Factory cut edges are less expensive to install than irregular stones since irregulars require chipping and fitting.
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