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Answers / Methods

Why does a wood-grain marble need a different substrate?

Because this stone is heavy and rigid and does not flex, so it takes the movement of the building rather than absorbing it. The substrate has to be flat enough for the back of the slab to bed, and the fixing has to allow the panel to move without the stone cracking.
A finished interior with dark wood-grain stone cladding on the walls, a matching stone floor, dark doors and a black sculpture on a plinth
Wall cladding in a room: the panels are fixed and the joints are vertical.
Application image, a design render rather than a photograph. A corridor lined floor to ceiling in the stone, with a continuous light line washing the panel joints and open niches let into the left-hand wall.
A corridor where the wall cladding runs the length of the room.

Reference photographs. They show the material and the finish; they are not photographs of goods we made, and the colour on screen is not a colour-match.

The figures, and where each one comes from

What the substrate must do Why
Be flat to the tolerance of the fixing system A stone does not bed on a dip
Carry the wet load of the stone Dry fixing puts the panel on the adhesive, not the wall
Allow the structure to move without racking the stone Panels are rigid and the frame is not

Why it behaves the way it does

A timber wall moves with humidity, and a marble wall does not, so a marble wall has to be detailed differently rather than installed better. The panel is the stiffest thing in the wall and the movement has to pass behind it.

What these figures are, and what they are not

We supply the stone. We do not supply a structural fixing design, and this page does not replace a project engineer's detail for a specific wall.

Measured data sheets and test reports

If you are specifying this

We have not published products against this question yet. Send us the process, thickness and quantity and we will quote it against what we can actually form, rather than against a catalogue.

Send a specification Ask for a sample

Because this stone is heavy and rigid and does not flex, so it takes the movement of the building rather than absorbing it. The substrate has to be flat enough for the back of the slab to bed, and the fixing has to allow the panel to move without the stone cracking.

The figures

What the substrate must do Why
Be flat to the tolerance of the fixing system A stone does not bed on a dip
Carry the wet load of the stone Dry fixing puts the panel on the adhesive, not the wall
Allow the structure to move without racking the stone Panels are rigid and the frame is not

Why

A timber wall moves with humidity, and a marble wall does not, so a marble wall has to be detailed differently rather than installed better. The panel is the stiffest thing in the wall and the movement has to pass behind it.

What these figures are, and what they are not

We supply the stone. We do not supply a structural fixing design, and this page does not replace a project engineer’s detail for a specific wall.

Where this applies on this site