Crushed stone about 10–15 mm in size, painted with bright colors, is decorative. Stones do not tarnish, regardless of natural conditions. The use of such material in landscape design of various types of sites - from flower beds to the bottom of reservoirs - is popular and non-toxic. If you want to learn how to use crushed gravel and paint it yourself, read the article below.

Advantages and disadvantages of decorative gravel

To begin with, it is worth considering the positive qualities. Crushed stone is useful because it passes moisture, but also prevents it from weathering. The second function of the material is protection against weed germination. And, of course, loose stone can be painted in your preferred colors, and if you wish, you can move it from one area to another, change the shapes that they laid out before. In order to color the material yourself, it is important to know its simplest characteristics.

• In addition to the advantages, it is useful to know some disadvantages:
• colored stone chips are characterized by fraction and type and, depending on the data, can have a high price (from 21 rubles per kg or 600 rubles per bag of 20 kg);
• it is very inconvenient to clean the area laid out by gravel.

How crushed stone is used in design

Flower beds, lawns, decorated roads, imitation of water - these are classic examples of the use of crushed stone. Lay out a specific place, for example, a playground, or arrange sculptures and monuments concisely and tastefully capable of good designers.

A private person can also decorate a garden, a land plot, a selected summer cottage territory. The breadth of application of beautiful stone chips is limited only by space, imagination and the presence of a sense of style. But all building and decorative materials have certain characteristics, important parameters that you need to know.

Did you know? In gardening and in the design of playgrounds, it is required to use first-class rubble for radioactivity.

Features of crushed stone are as follows:

1. Fraction. For example, euro-crushed stone has sizes from 3 to 8 mm. Grinding from 5 to 10 and from 10 to 20 mm is also suitable for decoration.
2. Flatterymeasured in percent (grain shape characteristic). There are 5 groups, among them cube-shaped and improved types - from 10 to 15% of the content of needle-like particles.
3. Frost resistance. In this case, stone chips are divided into grades (F15 – F400).
4. Strength. This parameter is important in construction.
5. Varieties (granite, limestone, marble, slag and secondary types of crushed stone).

The material chosen to the required standards is easy to apply. The modern construction market and design offers offer a ready-made stone powder suitable for decoration.

She, depending on the style, decorate:

• patio;
• landscape artificial reservoirs;
• rock gardens;
• Japanese gardens.

How and how to paint crushed stone

Marble and granite crushed stone ranging from 10 to 15 mm is suitable for painting.

It is further recommended to follow this procedure:

1. Pour the material onto a sieve (as for sieving) and dip it into a large container with water. Rinse.
2. Lay the oilcloth on the ground, sprinkle crumbs there and dry it for an hour.
3. Then fill the concrete mixer (aerosol cans can be used instead) with gravel, fill the paint in stages (depending on the desired shade, usually the dye is dissolved and the result obtained is applied with respect to the amount of gravel 1: 5). Water-based and acrylic coloring agents are suitable.
4. The next stage is the drying of the painted material. Why again you need to put it on the grid, let the excess paint drain. To do everything neatly and apply the paint surplus next time, just place the pan under the sieve.

Do-it-yourself application of crushed stone in landscape design

With the help of laying stone chips, you can create thoughtful drawings of various nature on the territory of the garden plot, lay ornate paths and conceived inscriptions or patterns, decorate flower beds, delimit spatial zones. The rules for laying crushed stone, allowing to carry out events without errors, are presented below.

Important! If you have chosen a stone of different sizes, you need to sift it at an angle of 60° using a metal mesh. This will help remove too large stones.

Site preparation

The site should be prepared in advance:

1. Mark the necessary boundaries.
2. Remove about 10 cm of soil.
3. Install fencing borders (brick, natural stone, fences made of wood, plastic or metal), digging them into the soil.
4. Pour sand into the resulting trenches and depressions, which will be the basis for laying (the height of the sand compaction is from 5 cm).
5. This layer needs to be leveled and watered, thus the layer shrinks.

Selection of materials and tools

For painting, aerosol products in containers or suitable coloring materials are used, which are poured into concrete mixers. When drying after washing and painting, you need a metal mesh and a tray for draining liquids. The limestone material of gravel is not used for coloring - it is not suitable for its characteristics. Granite or marble stone is perfectly painted.

Important! To prevent weeds from growing, it is useful to use herbicides with which to process the territory to be formed.

Borders should be selected in such a size as to dig them into the ground to a depth sufficient for the strength of the installation. Instead of this type of delimiter, plastic sheets can be used. Wood is also suitable, which is especially well combined with crushed stone of natural shades in the design of Japanese gardens.

Will also be required for work at different stages:

• construction car;
• plastic film or geotextile;
• shovels and buckets;
• ropes and pegs for marking the place;
• rake for leveling layers.

Styling technology

Thinking over the stencil is important in advance. If a pattern with combinations of colored gravel is conceived, then the border of different colors needs to be created using the same borders that were used to prepare the place to create the total area of ​​the composition.

Next you need to follow this instruction:

1. Lay perforated polyethylene to drain moisture.
2. Pour about 3 cm more sand onto the film.
3. Cover the stencil with decorative stone chips evenly.
4. When making a flower bed or lawn, you need to make a laying height of 2-3 cm according to well-thought-out technology, for roads, trails and playgrounds - up to 6 cm.

Video: Crushed stone technology

In landscape design, it is customary to use such styling methods: to simulate flowing water, for example, to lay bulk material in wave-like lines, and to give a natural picture to it, you can install unpainted boulders and glass rubble - this creates the perception of a certain mountainous area. To use the existing bumps in the terrain is very useful.

Did you know? Limestone screening is used as an additive in livestock feed - it is a source of useful minerals for animals.

The option of decorating a shady area with crumb stone allows you to select a place where vegetation is invisible or absent. A stone of green, white or blue color is ideal for designing the bottom of a pond. So the water will look brighter. Gravel gardens are becoming more and more popular every day, in which gravel is combined with low and unpretentious species of conifers or other shrubs and grasses. The use of monophonic and monochrome colors is great for making a picture that sets up a calm mood and contemplation.