The client came to me with some jeopardy!
To paraphrase... “We wanted some low dry-stone retaining walls to raise up some beds; our gardeners said OK, did a foundation trench, ordered some stone, and then found they could not get their heads around it!” This was close to Hampton Court in Surrey and not a typical DSW area
Bags of unknown stone sitting on the drive, about 15m of edging dug out and filled with rough grit in the rear garden. With a few attempts at walling lying around.
I did a bit of chin stroking (as I had a couple of other jobs in progress already), but as it was a 30m cycle ride away said I could take it on at a day or two a week. The clients were happy with that and it was summer, so I though I could juggle my other clients, who was used to a day a week, without too many issues.
The gardeners helpfully wheel-barrowed the rest of the stone into the back garden for me before I started on site, it would have taken at least half a day to do it myself.
The stone was fresh quarried and had to be broken down as needed. Many oversize pieces, some lumpy ones smashed for filling, others trimmed for use, many went into foundations. The build went semi-smoothly. I say 'semi' as initially the clients seemed a bit concerned when not much wall appeared as I focussed on foundations. They were OK with my reassurance it would speed up a bit soon. The summer sun was getting to a real peak and I tried to time my position on the curved wall to be in the shade. There was a garden umbrella available too that they offered for my use.
The low retaining walls were to be flat topped, but they wanted steps up in one corner to a raised area where a table and chairs could be placed. My plan was to pick out good candidate stones for this as they turned up and put then to one side to do it at the end.
Eventually, it was all done, a week or two later than hoped. There was about a tone+ of stone left over (of which they let me pick as much as I liked for a minimal payment, and I subsequently used it at home for a small feature).
