One of the biggest crazes in antique collecting in recent years has been an explosion of interest in 18th and 19th century garden sculpture. While many people would love to collect statuary, it is simply far too expensive for most people. Perhaps to compensate, many collectors turned to stonework.
It was common practice for people during the above mentioned time periods to fill their gardens with statuary, benches, sundials, and other similar works of art. Modern antique collectors have learned that these long ignored pieces are a fun and relatively inexpensive way to collect unusual pieces of fine art.
An important thing for anyone interested in collecting stonework garden sculpture is to be able to identify the materials used in the object's construction. This information has a tremendous affect on the value of an antique as well as determining the best ways to clean and care for the item.
While this list is by no means complete, it will provide a good starting point for identifying the most common stonework materials. Included are the defining characteristics of the material and other hints that will help a collector to know their stone before purchase.
Marble is, of course one of the most famous and desired of stonework material. Marble has been used for thousands of years to create statuary for several reasons. It is fairly easy to work with and polishes into a beauty rarely rivaled by any other material. Identifying marble is a simple matter. In its pure state, marble is very hard and pure white. It is impurities in the stone that gives marble its colored streaks.
Limestone was a very common material for garden art and urns during the eighteenth century. It is very easy to work with and was inexpensive when compared to granite or marble. The ease with which limestone can be worked also points to its biggest drawback. Limestone is so soft that antique statues are often marred with pits and scratches. Normally limestone is a light earthy color. Light brown and grey are the most common colors. By the way, marble is just limestone that has been exposed to incredible pressure and heat and is formed in a manner similar to how carbon is turned into diamonds.
Even softer and more malleable than limestone is magnesium silicate, commonly called soapstone. Color is of very little help in identifying soapstone sculptures. Soapstone can be almost any color from green to brown to white. While color might not help, texture certainly does. Soapstone is very soft and has an almost oily feel to the touch.
Granite is a beautiful material for sculpture and garden fixtures. It is extremely hard and so is also very durable. Granite can be polished to a gloss second only to marble. It is a relatively rare material for garden sculpture when compared to others discussed here. Granite varies somewhat in color and general appearance depending on the minerals contained with in it but normally it is grey-white but may well have red streaks or a pinkish tint.
Alabaster when polished closely resembles marble but is much, much softer. Like marble, alabaster can be polished to an incredible gloss and often has color veins and streaks very similar to marble. Dishonest antique dealers will sometimes try to pass alabaster off as marble but close examination of the antique may well reveal tiny scratches and pock marks that would be very unlikely to appear on a marble piece.
Sandstone is a fairly common material for garden urns, benches, and the like because it is a very soft stone and is quite easy to work with. However, this also means it does not wear well. Sandstone statuary is often, especially if left outdoors for extended periods, eroded, stained, or chipped. It can be easily identified due to the softness of the stone and its unusual warm beige or light brown color.
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Silas Finch is a freelance writer and regular contributor to Collectible Antiques Etc. He can be reached at Content and
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