Our Blog
Retaining Wall Design: The Forces That Decide Everything Else
A retaining wall quote is a list of decisions. How deep the base goes. How much block sits below the grass. How wide the stone column behind it is. Whether reinforcement mesh shows up, and how far back you dig to place it. None of those are style choices. Each one...
Retaining Wall Permits: The Height That Triggers Review
Almost every article about a retaining wall permit hands you a number. Four feet. The number is real, but it answers a narrower question than most people think, and it is not automatically the rule at your address. More than one height is in play. One decides whether...
Retaining Wall Cost: Why Height Changes the Price More Than Length
Most people size a retaining wall by how long it is. Length is the number you can pace off in the yard, so it is the number in the first phone call. It also tells you the least about what the wall will cost. Length is repetition. A wall twice as long is the same wall...
Retaining Wall Ideas That Work With Your Slope, Not Against It
Most retaining wall idea lists are galleries. A curved wall in a catalog, a terraced hillside in a magazine, a seating wall around a fire pit. They look good, and they tell you nothing about whether any of it belongs in your yard. What decides that is the grade, not...
Types of Retaining Walls: Which One Your Slope Actually Needs
Seven structural types of retaining wall are in general use. On a residential lot in Indianapolis you will almost certainly end up with one of two. The other five are worth knowing so you can rule them out on purpose. The deciding question is not which material you...
What Is a Retaining Wall: Why Water Matters More Than Soil
A retaining wall is a structure that holds soil in place where the ground changes height faster than soil can hold itself. That is the whole definition. Everything else is about what the wall has to survive to keep doing it. Most explanations stop at the soil, which...
RG Decor and Wicker Works on 96th Street: Furnishing an Indianapolis Outdoor Room
In 1984 the Schrack family opened Wicker Works in Brownsburg. It grew into one of the better known casual furniture stores in Indiana, and it stayed in the family for decades. Then the family was ready to retire, and there was no third generation to take it on. That...
Northwest Lumber Company: Indianapolis Hardwood for Outdoor Projects Since 1956
There is a certain kind of store that survives by being the only place that still does something. Northwest Lumber Company on Lafayette Road is one of them. It opened in 1956 as a hardware store that sold construction grade plywood and lumber, which was a perfectly...
Carter-Lee Lumber: An Indianapolis Lumberyard Since 1878
In 1878, Indiana sat at the center of the American hardwood industry. Sawmills ran across the state, the timber moved by rail and river, and Indianapolis was a place where a lumber business made obvious sense. Carter-Lee Lumber Company started that year. It is still...
Silver Creek Engineering: When an Indianapolis Deck Needs an Engineer’s Stamp
Most decks never involve an engineer. A modest structure at a normal height on ordinary ground can usually be built from the prescriptive tables in the building code, and the plan reviewer signs it off without further questions. Then there are the other ones. The deck...