Loth & SonLawn Care & Landscaping
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Paver patios and walks that stay level.

Paver patios, walkways and steps across Lower Merion Township and the Main Line. The base, the drainage and the edge restraint are the work; fall is the best time to build.

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A grey paver pad and walkway laid in a running bond with a soldier-course border, meeting an existing concrete walk and stone steps.
Paver pad and walk, cut in to meet the existing concrete and the stone steps.

How we think about it

Most people looking for a paver contractor near them are looking at a surface that has already failed once. A front walk with a dip at the threshold. A patio with two stones that rock under a chair leg. A garden path where the joints have opened and the sand has washed down the slope. That is almost never the paver itself, which is a dense unit of concrete or stone and does not much care what the winter does. It is what was put underneath it, or what was not.

Under a patio that stays level there is excavated subgrade, a depth of compacted crushed stone placed in lifts of a few inches at a time rather than dumped and rolled once, and a thin screeded setting bed. The stones go down tight against each other, cut in at the edges with a saw instead of filled with slivers, and every open side gets an edge restraint spiked into the base. Skip the restraint and the outside course creeps outward a little each season until the joints open, the sand leaves, and the weeds find the gap. Then the whole edge has to come up.

On the property

Round stepping stones set into a river stone bed with granite cobble edging and low path lights, curving past a mailbox toward a driveway.
Stepping stones in river stone, cobble edge, path lights set the same day.
Two crew members planting along a new gravel path, with flats of perennials and a wheelbarrow on the open ground.
Planting the edges of a new path, the same week the stone went down.

What this covers

  • Paver patios

    Excavation, base, setting bed, laying, cutting and jointing for a patio built to sit flat and drain away from the house.

  • Front walks and walkways

    Entry walks and side walks laid to a consistent width and a clean line, with the pitch set so water leaves rather than stands.

  • Garden paths and stepping stones

    Paths through beds and lawn, including stepping stones set on stone rather than dropped on soil, with cobble or steel edging where a bed meets turf.

  • Steps and landings

    Paver and stone steps with even risers and treads, built on a footing or compacted base so the run does not settle out of level.

  • Base, grading and drainage

    Subgrade excavation, compaction in lifts, and the grades and pitch that decide where water goes once the surface is closed.

  • Edge restraint and jointing

    Restraint pinned along every open edge, joints swept and compacted, and the surface checked over before we leave.

One crew does the excavation, the base and the laying, across Penn Valley, Merion Station, Wynnewood, Bala Cynwyd, Ardmore and Narberth. Free written estimates, answered in one to two business days.

Questions we get asked

  • Can you lay pavers on soil?

    You can, and it will look right for a season. Soil holds water, moves with frost and compresses unevenly under load, so by the second spring you have dips, rocking stones and a walk that puddles. Pavers need a compacted stone base to spread load and drain, with a screeded setting bed on top of it. Stepping stones through a planting bed are the one reasonable exception, and even those sit better on a few inches of stone.

  • What goes under pavers?

    From the bottom up: compacted subgrade, then crushed stone base placed and compacted in lifts of two to three inches, then roughly an inch of screeded coarse sand or stone dust as a setting bed. The stones sit on that, get compacted in, and the joints are swept full. Along every open edge a restraint is spiked into the base. How deep the stone goes depends on use and on drainage — a garden path needs less than a patio, and a patio less than anything a vehicle crosses.

Also

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Free, written down, answered in one to two business days. Or call Rathana on 215-803-7742.