Design

How do you find the right contractor and what should you expect when you hire them? “Under Your Roof And In Your Backyard” with Dean Marsico and Derek Stearns dedicated an entire episode to this very question.

Dean Marsico and Derek Stearns are cousins and stone experts with over 25 years in the masonry business. They are proven lead consultants that every architect should have on their team.

This stone piece is my passport to the wild kingdom. I can’t help but get lost in the motion of the marble that emerges from 60,000 intricate pieces of stone. The mosaic process is called tesserae and was inspired by famed artist Victor Vasarely.

Shades of white Danby marble, pinned deep inside the belly of the earth, pulsate magnetic charm. That is, until man gambles it all to extract these gems that spark fate to furbish institutions, embellish homes, enhance landscapes and memorialize with stoic elegance.

How each piece of a company’s visual identity works together to communicate the brand’s essence is important. Good graphic designers don’t begin concepting in isolation.

You can’t be a stone designer and not know Michelangelo’s quote: “I saw the angel in the marble and carved until I set him free.” This happened when master stone carvers Gerd and Patrick Dreher carved a piece of tourmaline into a gorgeous stone toad in Germany.

Finally, meditation rooms are demanding space on blueprints. A dynamic leader in “calm” design, Meichi Peng focuses on areas specifically for rejuvenation. Stone is an essential ingredient found in most of her peaceful spaces.

In 1970, a silver mine in Mexico released a 70-pound piece of turquoise from the earth, and a talented stone carver saw its future.

Naturally formed objects above and below the earth led me to a fascination with petrified wood. Gigantic trees plunged into the earth, starved of oxygen and buried in total darkness for over 200 million years almost magically turns wood into stone.

Working with materials that are millions of years old, I sometimes can feel like an intruder. But on a recent buying trip, my tour guides had me examine fossils, and I felt just the opposite. Perfectly preserved, unaltered, immortal beauty – I felt embraced by the open arms of these prehistoric gems.

As a designer, I’m fortunate to work in many small towns. Growing up in Lincoln, I am overcome with nostalgia every time I drive down Boston Post Road, homesick for the quirks of small-town life.

Ancient stones meticulously fused with driftwood that tell a mentoring story? This was the magic I found at Bunch of Grapes Bookstore in Martha’s Vineyard, when I discovered celebrated artist Lew French and his amazing work.

With the new year comes new goals and initiatives. Since the end of last year, we’ve been discussing improving décor, changing around photos and cleaning up our clutter to feel refreshed, so I wanted to bring you some simple office tips that will improve the space around you.

If 2017 made you exhausted and you need a way to ramp up your energy for 2018, let me introduce you to some of my favorite stones to design with that have the power to turbocharge your life.

I’m the world’s biggest Natural Stone NERD. I love the mystical, natural energy this antique expels, and admittedly, not too many man-made materials interest me.

People often ask, “What’s your favorite stone?” My answer is easy: one I haven’t seen before!

Boston is described as a historic and traditional city with a European feel. While that may be true, and we embrace it, the face of Boston is changing. People are living their lives differently, and the modern aesthetic in the design and architecture of Boston is a reflection of this.

Last April, my boss and stone mentor Ivo Cubi, owner of Cumar Marble and Granite, sent me to Italy where I fell in love with a white, gray, black and “greenery” colored stone called “White Beauty.” It whispered my favorite mentoring question: What do you see that I can become?