ᐅ What should be considered when building a natural stone wall using slate?

Dear forum members,

I would like to build some freestanding natural stone walls made of slate in my garden as property boundaries. They should look like ruins, so the top edge should not be smooth but uneven, varying between about 1 meter and 1.8 meters (3 feet 3 inches and 6 feet).

I cannot find any posts in the German-speaking area that specifically address slate and what to watch out for when using it. What I do find are posts about natural stone walls in general. These cover basic points such as:

• Foundation down to the frost line
• At least as wide as the wall will be later
• Reinforcing bars in the foundation, ideally extended up to the top of the wall to create a stable unit
• Washing stones before installation
• Using through-stones for tension relief within the wall
• Always building freestanding walls with a double layer

Do you have any additional input for me? What I listed makes sense, but I find nothing specific to slate and whether there are further pitfalls. Is there a special type of cement I should use?

I would appreciate any tips. I don’t want the wall(s) to be damaged after five years.

Thank you and best regards,
Marko

Whatever a "Durchstein" is supposed to be, by "two-row" you probably mean the stretcher courses? Are you planning to build the wall using wet masonry?

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I translated "Durchstein" from English; these are called throughstones there. These stones are visible from both the front and the back. They are supposed to provide stability by helping the two rows hold together as much as possible.

By two-row construction, I mean that when looking from above, there are two rows lying side by side so that both sides have a neat facade. I will try to illustrate this with a picture.

Yes, I want to use wet masonry, as I see a bit more stability in it for such a tall freestanding wall.

MarkosGarten schrieb:

I translated the term "Durchstein" from English. In English, these are called throughstones. These are stones visible from both the front and the back of the wall. They are supposed to provide stability by tying the two rows together as much as possible.

So, a classic wall with alternating stretcher and header courses (the latter would be your "throughstones").
Maybe the search term "dry stone terraced wall" will help you (?)
Your project is, to put it mildly, "not trivial." Building it wet might be somewhat easier for a non-professional, but dry construction would be better due to the structure's resistance to temperature fluctuations. I’d say everyone has to find their own way to test it.

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https://www.instagram.com/11antgmxde/
https://www.linkedin.com/company/bauen-jetzt/

Non-trivial, indeed. Over the past few days, I have moved 15 tons of slate stones into my garden using a wheelbarrow and neatly stacked them. But that is only the physically demanding part. I can handle that easily.

I have two questions in particular:
Which type of cement should I use to prevent the wall from crumbling again next winter? Perhaps there is a type that works especially well with slate.
Is it possible to build the wall step by step, or centimeter by centimeter, with a day’s pause between each stage, or do I have to work continuously using the "wet-on-wet" method?

What shape are your slate tiles?