Driveways & entries
The half of the property every visitor sees and no one designs.
A driveway carries vehicle loads, which rules out most of what works on a patio, and an entry is the first thing anyone arriving forms an opinion about. They are usually specified together and usually last.
Tumbled concrete paver
Vehicle-rated, and one unit lifts if a utility has to come up.
The standard interlocking paver, tumbled in a drum so the edges and faces read as worn rather than moulded. The default surface on most San Diego backyards for a reason.
Permeable paver
Sometimes a choice, sometimes what plan check asks for.
Units set with deliberately open joints over an open-graded stone reservoir, so rain goes down instead of across. Sometimes a design choice, sometimes what the plan check asks for.
Colour families — no photo heldExposed aggregate
Wears hard, grips wet, does not date.
The cement paste is washed off the top to reveal the stone in the mix. Hard-wearing, high grip, and it looks like what it is — which is why it never really goes out of fashion in a coastal yard.
Colour families — no photo heldFlagstone
The path off the drive, where irregular reads as arrival.
Irregular split stone, laid either dry with planted joints or wet-set on a slab. No two pieces match, which is either the whole appeal or the reason you rule it out.
Cut ashlar stone
Entry columns and the face of a low front wall.
Stone sawn to rectangular units and laid in courses. More formal than fieldstone, less repetitive than manufactured, and the pattern that sits most comfortably against a traditional house.
Colour families — no photo held