Millstone Grit Cairn

Millstone Grit Cairn, originally uploaded by escher1.

I've always wanted to build a big cairn like Goldsworthy's stone cones. Obviously the design is based on his but I went for a slightly different look, I wanted the curve to be symmetrical for both the bottom and top sections. I think I have achieved that to some degree. The first two attempts collapsed early on but the third worked. I had to pay more attention to making sure that long, large and heavy stones are placed often enough, to anchor the small stones on the outside. These long stones are positioned like spokes all the way through the cairn. When it was nearly done there was a loud crack as a stone snapped in the middle. My heart was in my mouth as it shifted and settled but it held. I could only spend a few hours each day building the cairn so it wasn't until the third day that I completed it. THis was a couple of hours into a big storm that dropped 2 inches of rainfall and brought 80mph winds. This meant that I couldn't film or photograph the finished cairn. Instead I had to leave in a hurry thoroughly drenched, hoping that it would stay up to be documented on a calmer day. Fortunately it has and I managed to get some pictures and film the day after I finished it.