Bluestone Patio Overview

After an addition to this home in Concord, MA the homeowners were looking to install a stone patio off of their rear deck/entry way.  The layout was fairly straightforward and they decide to use bluestone as the paving material.

Excavation

After deciding on the patio dimensions we excavate the area with bobcat.  There is a lot of good topsoil so we spread it around the side of the house where the previous construction had destroyed the lawn.  By spending a little extra time moving the soil we kill two birds with one stone for the homeowner.  We excavate to a depth of ~10″ – this leaves enough room for a 7″ gravel base, 1″ stone dust bedding, and 1.5″ thick bluestones.  The sub-base is first compacted with a vibrating plate compactor, and then the gravel spread and compacted.  A  patio base like this is very sturdy and won’t settle, drains water well, and remains flexible to any ground movement down the road.

Installation

Once the patio base prep is done we spread and screed the stone dust.  Stone dust is a finely crushed stone that is the consistency of sand.  We are able to screed the stone dust perfectly flat, and this lets us lay the bluestone pavers.

The bluestone comes in a variety of sizes and we take care to lay them as randomly as possible.  The goals is to avoid running joints and four corners, and to mix the different sizes in evenly.

The bluestone patio installation is complete.  Next we sweep in the joint sand and the patio is ready to use.