Fitting it all togetherStone Business - December, 2002 |
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There's something at the entrance to South Pasadena, Fla., that's officially termed a work of public art - and it's a classy work in stone as well. The mural, designed and constructed by Creative Edge Mastershop of Fairfield, Iowa, measures 25' x 18'. In a way, it's also more than one job; it's two-sided, with the same design and waterjet-cut work on both sides. Harri Aalto, creative director at Creative Edge, says the project took four months from initial work with South Pasadena officials to the final installation and landscaping of the project. Creative Edge's work included the engineering of the project's structure, which includes underground footing to meet Florida's requirements for construction in tropical-storm zones. |
"Working closely with city officials, we were able to create a public-art piece that attracts much local attention and inspires positive community response," Aalto says. The mural is a mix of stone and ceramic pieces, although most of the color is provided with natural stone. Aalto says the work includes blue marble from Greece and granites from India, including a sandy-brown Kashmir Gold and the gold-flecked Galaxy Black. Creative Edge's waterjet cut pieces as small as 1/8" x 1/4", with the miniscule parts going in detail areas such as dolphins' eyes in the mosaic. All pieces were dry-fit, upside-down on granite before grouting and attachment. The mosaic was assembled into sectors of l' x l' tiles, and then crated and transported from Iowa to Florida. Creative VP Robert Sawyer then used his 30 years of experience in installation to assemble the project. "This level of detail and scale is only possible since the advent of computerized waterjet technology," says Jim Belilove, a Creative Edge partner. "For a successful waterjet project, all the components are necessary; the designers must work with the programmers, the programmers with the machine operators, and the completed job must be shipped safely and be installer-friendly when it arrives." |
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The project began with a concept sketch for customer approval.
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Once everyone agreed on the color rendering, Creative Edge began buying stone from various suppliers, |
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The sketch is then vectorized - put into line segments the waterjet can use for cutting - and put into AutoCAD@ to program the machine. |
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As the waterjet cuts the pieces, they're placed over an actual-size computer print to avoid missing pieces and assure color selection |
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Once the pieces are cut, the mosaic is assembled into 1' x 1' sections and laid upside-down on a thick granite slab to keep the design flat and guard against slippage. The pieces are then attached with epoxy and grouted. |
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The job arrives on-site in 1' x 1' tile section, crated and numbered to match the installation diagrams. Here, the job is thin-set to a cement block wall that's engineered to withstand hurricane-force winds. |
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| After grouting, the whole mural is dry-fit on the factory floor to assure fit, color and overall aesthetics. Then, the whole project is photographed. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| The Finished Product | |||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Copyright © 2008 Harri Aalto/CEC. All rights reserved. Click on a flag below to translate the page. Be patient. It takes a few moments.
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