Floor and Tread

300 × 300, 300 × 600, 400 × 400, 600 × 600 and 600 × 1200 mm, at 10 mm and 12 mm for tiling and 20 mm where a thicker edge is wanted. A floor is the one job where the grain direction is a decision the buyer makes: the same slab laid along the grain reads as boards, laid across it reads as a stone floor. A 20-foot container holds roughly 950 m² at 10 mm and roughly 450 m² at 20 mm.

A kerb is an edge, and an edge is the one part of a paving job that is seen from a car and hit by a wheel. Cut to the section, 30 mm at the top, and the top face is the face that is walked or driven on, so the grain is set to the surface.

Cut for the load and the finish, not for the grain: a path is walked on and looked at from above, and the figure is read from the surface rather than from the edge. 20 mm and 30 mm are the thicknesses that carry a path, and 30 mm is what a drive takes.

A plank is not a tile in a long box. It is cut from one slab so that a floor of them has the same grain running through it, which is the only version of this stone that reads as timber at full room width. The width is a decision the buyer makes, and the length is set by what the slab allows once the figure is accounted for.

Cut to the edge of the pool, with the top face bullnosed or eased so there is no arris to catch a foot or a chair. The stone is the same dense material as the paving; what the pool changes is the finish, and a slip-resistant face is specified for a wet edge.

Cut to the flight, with the grain running along the going so the lines read as the direction of travel. The nosing is the part that fails, so the tread is cut with the full thickness under the nosing rather than with the surface thinned to a bevel — a 20 mm tread with a bullnose, a bevel or a square edge with a radius relief, and the edge profile is chosen before the piece is cut. Thickness tolerance on a large piece is ±0.5 mm.