When you consider how to improve the appearance of your home in Lancaster, PA, or State College, PA, you could start with the look of your front walkway. Ideally, this landscape feature will be welcoming, safe to traverse, and complementary to the style of the home. How you wrap the walkway into your landscape along with the choice of materials are opportunities to get creative. A stone supply may suggest these seven materials to elevate a walkway project.
Related: HOW A MASONRY SUPPLY CAN HELP SELECT THE PATIO PAVERS TO USE IN YOUR NEXT LANCASTER, PA, PROJECT
Flagstone
Flagstone’s warm and earthy colors help to blend the walkway into the landscape. Choose smaller flagstone slabs (or concrete alternatives) for a texturally rich walkway, or larger slabs for a clean, modern look. Natural flagstone is naturally slip-resistant when wet, which is a great safety feature at a home’s entrance.
Brick
It’s hard to beat the classic look of brick. With so many laying patterns, you can achieve an elegant or rustic look. Brick comes in warm reds, neutral tans, and modern grays, chocolate browns, and blacks.
Cobblestones
Reciminscent of the ancient streets and walkways of some of the oldest cities in Europe and North Africa, cobblestones will always have a timeless charm. Cobblestones are small, somewhat rounded, which gives the walkway an interesting texture. Apart from making up the main field of a walkway, cobblestones are also excellent as accents and borders to wrap around another type of stone in your front walkway.
Bluestone
Bluestone is one of the most interesting options for natural stone. This gorgeous variant of flagstone features gorgeous steely blues and gray colors. Bluestone is quarried in the mid-Atlantic, which can make it an ideal native pairing for Pennsylvania homes. Bluestone can be absolutely stunning in a large-format style for a contemporary home aesthetic. Bluestone-inspired concrete pavers are an alternative: Mixing several available colors randomly onsite will help re-create the look of natural bluestone.
Slate
Slate features various shades of gray to evoke a dramatic feeling with a clearly visible sheen that becomes explicitly pronounced after a rain. It makes excellent contrasts with the bright green of lawns and also looks great next to dark wood. Slate is at times sealed to preserve its integrity, since it’s considered a relatively porous stone.
Limestone
Limestone is a timeless building material found all over the world. The cool grays and subtle patterns can make for a wonderfully sophisticated walkway that goes well with any style of home.
Granite
Granite is a famously durable and dense stone. Granite that is used outdoors is not polished to a glossy sheen like kitchen countertops (which would be dangerously slippery). Granite can be left in its natural unpolished state, which is actually very grippy when wet. And it’s a gorgeous look that enhances the look of any walkway.
The Spaces Between: Pea Gravel
The space between pavers can be the opportunity to make things not only visually interesting, but safer and more environmentally friendly. Using pea gravel instead of jointing sand allows water to seep through the space in between the pavers into the ground instead of flowing off to the side or collecting on the surface.
Shapes
A curved walkway tends to be inherently more interesting than a narrow, straight walkway. It can feel more organic and feel more a part of the landscaping, and could help to integrate your home with the landscape.
Related: 4 THINGS TO LOOK FOR IN A LANDSCAPE SUPPLY IN STATE COLLEGE, PA
Photo courtesy of Unilock
