Extolling StoneIdentity - July/Aug, 1994Page 1 2 3 4 5 |
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"Waterjet has enormous and still underused potential in applications such as the floor of a large public space or food court of a mall, in which the ability to match the tolerances of the interlocking patterns and graphic elements is critical,” observes IMC’s Tynan. “What used to take a carload of talented, second-generation craftspeople can now be mimicked with a good designer and a waterjet vendor." STONE SUBSTITUTES Diminishing the attributes of dimensional stone are two inherent characteristics that limit its use for signage: weight and absence of formability. The first quality increases shipping costs and places some heavy constraints on engineering. The second circumscribes the economic feasibility of creating curved shapes or custom dimensional graphics in quantity. However, whenever nature displays shortcomings, man makes up the difference. Today, a wide range of stone substitutes is available to the sign designer and specifier. Cast Stone This substance is to real stone perhaps what concentrated orange juice is to fresh squeezed. Cast stone is a poured or molded product that consists of real stone chips, mixed into a liquid matrix and then reformed. For creative purposes, formability and color control make cast stone a desirable commodity. Drawing the line between cast stone and concrete is more or less a matter of perception: cast stone still looks like stone and concrete looks like cement. Terrazzo, a product that dates at least back to the Romans, is a cast stone product used more and more frequently in recent years. In its modern form, terrazzo consists of a mixture of stone chips bonded with |
epoxy and poured into place, after which it is polished. According to Jeff Dahlberg of Chicago-based Terrazzo and Marble Supply Companies, terrazzo is increasingly being spec'ed for floor graphics in malls and other public spaces. "The patterns are laid out in strips on the floor and poured in place," says Dahlberg. "We can give the architect a wide color range because the epoxy resin is relatively easy to dye." Engineered Stone Heading this emerging category is a substance developed and manufactured by Mimco products of Anaheim, CA. Somewhere between the natural and the synthetic, Mimco stone has a realistic texture, to the point that it can pass for granite, sandstone, or lodestone both visually and tactilely. The reason for this is that real stone is literally ground up in a special resin formula and suspended on the surface of custom molds in a proprietary process invented by president Vic Peloquin. "Our product is lightweight because it's essentially hollow, but also structurally sound because it's backed up with fiberglass," explains Peloquin. In addition to the weight advantage, Mimco stone essentially allows the designer to pre-mold nature without the inconvenient carving process that Michelangelo went through. Initially finding a market in display and amusement applications, the Mimco simulated-stone process is beginning to see demand in signage. The product is particularly suitable for natural-looking designs that for all the world appear to be raw stone, serendipitously quarried with dimensional graphics and lettering in place. For a national identity program, Mimco stone becomes economically viable when produced in quantity. |
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