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Kevin Gardner Local Rock Wall Expert & Master Builder Hopkinton, NH

Stone walls. They seem to have a presence everywhere we look in New England, and its states, counties and towns are home to over 252,000 miles of stone walls. When New England farmers cleared their newfound land of its stones to make space for pastures and plots, would they ever have expected that the walls they made with such stones would be long enough to circle the Earth over 10 times? While stone walls have been considered a massive part of New England history and heritage for centuries, can we really consider them art? On a mission to answer this question, I talked with Kevin Gardner, a local rock wall expert and tradesman. A lifelong resident of Hopkinton, New Hampshire, Kevin is a man of many trades. Over his life, he has experimented with careers as a builder, logger, writer, teacher, radio voice, even an actor and director. However, what stands the most is his extensive knowledge of and experience with stone walls. This comes from his 40 years of being a stone wall builder in a family business widely known for traditional New England stonework, particularly for the historic restoration of antique structures. His accomplishments as a stone wall tradesman have led to him being one of the region’s esteemed “Master Builders” of stone walls. Along with his physical building of stone walls, he has also spent much of his time spreading his vast knowledge of the subject. He has written two books over the years, the first in 2001, called “The Granite Kiss: Traditions and Techniques of Building New England Stone Walls.” Sixteen years later, he published his second book, “Stone Building: How To Make New England Style Walls and Other Structures the Old Way.” Along with his books, he has also written multiple essays and poems about the subject, including the notable essay “Land of Stone,” published in the anthology “Where The Mountain Stands Alone” in 2006. Lastly, he has demonstrated and talked about the building of and history found in rock walls at multiple public events and has even featured on

Kevin Gardner

WMUR, New Hampshire Chronicle, and other media sources, where he explained how stone walls connect us to our past. Since his 2001 publication of “The Granite Kiss,” Kevin has presented his rock wall building program at dozens of historical societies, bookstores and town libraries all over New England, including Shaker Village, the NH Historical Society, Castle-in-the-Clouds, Old Sturbridge Village, Boston’s Arnold Arboretum, and many more. In his presentations, he covers topics from his books, such as how and why New England came to be home to hundreds of thousands of miles of rock walls. While doing all of this and more, he is building a miniature stone wall out of small stones that he brings in a bucket, thus demonstrating this information in the best way possible, physically. The following is the short Q&A session that I had with Kevin.

Where in stone wall building do you feel a strong connection with art?

This is a very complex question, depending at least partly on what one thinks “art” is. For me, stone wall building isn’t really an art because it’s not fundamentally a medium of self-expression the way music, poetry and painting are. One other feature of “art,” at least according to Antonin Artaud, is gratuitousness, that is to say, non-necessity. We don’t need it for survival. But stone walls, at one time anyway, were quite necessary for the maintenance of a certain way of life here in New England. Many people think of stone wall building as an art; it’s true, but this is largely because they don’t know how it’s done, so they think there’s something mysterious and special about those who do. But even Dan Snow, one of the greatest living dry-laid wall builders, whose work is often wonderfully and unnecessarily beautiful in its placement and patterning, says he never sets to work on something with the idea of making it pretty, but only with the goal of creating a sound structure. The beauty will take care of itself, he says. I feel the same way ... if I practice the craft of building with care, what I make will be attractive without the benefit of self-conscious “artistry.” The “art” of stone walls is as much a projection of their appreciators as it is an inherent quality, perhaps even more so.

When in life did you know confidently that stone wall building was your calling?

Well, never, really. I don’t think of life that way. I guess “calling” sounds vaguely religious, like a sort of revelation that THIS is what you were put on earth to do. I think I developed a gradual understanding that I was good enough at wall building to make part of my living doing it, but that’s about all.

What was the main reason that led you to write books, host presentations, and spread your knowledge of stone walls to the world?

The main reason I started doing these things is that at a certain point, people began asking me to do them. I’ve been performing in front of audiences in various ways since I was nine years old, so it was a natural extension of that, too, even with

Along with Kevin Gardner’s years of stone wall building, he has also spent much of his time spreading his vast knowledge of the subject. He has written two books over the years, the first in 2001, called “The Granite Kiss: Traditions and Techniques of Building New England Stone Walls.” Sixteen years later, he published his second book, “Stone Building: How To Make New England Style Walls and Other Structures the Old Way.”

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What has 40-plus years of stone wall creation taught you, and how has it changed you as a person?

Well, it’s certainly taught me a good deal about how to make decent walls. Along with that, I think I’ve learned a certain amount of patience with [the] process, and this has carried over to other vocations as well. The stonework is a useful metaphor for anything that requires cumulative, deliberate assembly, like a play, a book, a multitrack recording, or a woodpile. But how has it changed me? Who the hell knows? I can’t say anything about the sort of person I might have become if I’d never learned to build because that’s not what happened. (Also, I’m only fleetingly conscious of the kind of person I am now. So the very idea of projecting the multi-dimensional Butterfly Effect of such excision is simply beyond me. There are too many possibilities, including no effect at all.) Stonework has changed one undeniable thing, however. It has absolutely wrecked my knees.

Any advice for readers inspired to build their own stone walls on their properties?

I have lots of advice for would-be builders, and almost all of it is in my books. For our purposes, however, I’ll just offer two general encouragements: If you’re thinking about trying this craft for yourself, don’t hesitate! It’s work, that’s for sure, but not nearly as brutal or punishing as it’s sometimes made out to be, and its pleasures and satisfactions are well worth the trouble. Second, give yourself time to get it: I’ve often pointed out that the basic principles of dry stone building can be learned in a day, but it takes lots of practice and patience before the light really comes on.

FRANKIE BRACKLEY TOLMAN

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