Granite is also found in an array of colours, making it suitable for a range of spaces and styles. Its popularity is down to its high compressive strength, durability and low porosity. It is used for everything from load-bearing structures to cladding, worktops and furniture. It forms from the slow crystallisation of magma beneath the Earth's crust. Granite is one of the most widely used stones in architecture and design.
It can also be used as a cladding material, such as in Bernardo Bader Architekten's ski resort office in Austria and a radio broadcasting station in Nepal by Archium. Peter Pichler sourced grey gneiss with black-and-white bands from Passeier Valley in South Tyrol to create a large counter in the bar of an Italian Alpine hotel (above). Hues can range from pinks and golds to greens and dark greys. Gneiss, a robust metamorphic stone composed of alternating layers of different coloured minerals, is popular to use for flooring and worktops. Skene Catling de la Peña used a combination of knapped and unknapped flint to cover a wedge-shaped house in Buckinghamshire (above), which creates a subtle colour gradient across its facade. In architecture, it is usually knapped – split to expose its glossy inner face – before being laid in mortar.
It has been used as a construction material since the Roman era, though it is not often seen in contemporary architecture.įlint varies in colour, but it is commonly glassy black with a white crust. Icelandic studio Innriinnri used two sculpted slabs of basalt stone to create a sculptural table that doubles as a stool or a piece of art, while South Korean artist Byung Hoon Choi polished the stone to create oversized outdoor furniture.įlint is a highly durable stone found in abundance as irregular-shaped nodules in sedimentary rocks such as chalk. It is most frequently used as an aggregate for concrete as it is low-cost and high-strength, but it is also a popular cladding and flooring material, especially when polished.Įxamples of this include the facade of a small gallery in Amsterdam by Barend Koolhaas and a Hawaiian holiday home by Walker Warner Architects in which slender basalt cladding tiles are contrasted with cedar detailing (above). Amarist Studio showcased the sculptural possibilities of the stone in its Aqua Fossil collection, which includes a coffee table with swooping, curved legs.īasalt is a dark-coloured igneous rock that is formed when lava cools rapidly.
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