An unused corner of Cambria County Library, rebuilt as a patio

Cambria County Library had a donor-funded project, a corner of the grounds nobody used, and a community with nowhere outside to sit.

The area was overgrown shrubs and grass. It was the kind of space that is easy to walk past for years, and hard to picture as anything else, which is where most of our commercial work starts.

The approach

Every project of ours begins the same way, whether it is a backyard or a public building. A designer comes to the site, walks it with you and takes measurements. From there the design comes back as a 3D visual, and we sit down together to finalise colours, features, layout and pricing before anything is ordered.

For a donor-funded build that step matters more than usual. The people paying for it and the people who will use it are not the same group, so everyone needs to see the thing before it is built.

What we built

The overgrown area came out and a patio went in: a fully functional space with room for the library to put chairs and tables and hold things outdoors. Our hardscapes are built from interlocking pavers or natural stone, laid to ICPI standards, and the workmanship carries our lifetime warranty. On a public site that gets walked over every day, that specification is the whole point.

The result

A piece of ground that was doing nothing now belongs to the people who use the library. It is the same work we do behind a house, on a site where a lot more people get to sit in it.