Strata Stone Mold

Layers that took millions of years to form

Sedimentary rocks built up in layers on the beds of seas and lakes: every flood, every period of drought and every supply of a different material left a band of a different color and hardness. When such a sequence was later lifted and cut through by a river or a road cutting, a book of horizontal bands was laid bare, in which the softer layers receded and the harder ones stood out like ledges. The relief in this mold corresponds to precisely such a place, so it suits banks, cuttings, the walls of quarries and everywhere it is meant to be evident at first glance that the rock has a structure.

How to join castings up

With layered rock one single thing is decisive: the lines have to continue. Two castings side by side with shifted bands look unnatural even if each one is perfect in itself. That is why neighboring parts are laid so that the layers join up, and the gap is filled with the remainder of the mass before it sets. Where joining up will not work, a joint cut vertically across the layers helps, of the kind that arises in nature from a tectonic fault.

The mold is flexible, so a casting is tipped out of it by bending the edges and needs no release agent. It will stand many uses one after another, only it is advisable to rinse it after removal, because remains stuck in the deeper places gradually fill the relief up and a new casting then comes out flatter.

Castings are sanded on the underside before being laid on, so that they seat on a slope over their whole area and do not rock. Any remaining gap at the foot is masked with loose material, because a real wall too passes at the bottom into rubble broken from its own surface. It is only that transition that makes a separate piece into part of a landscape.