A sensibly designed driveway is always eye catching when someone turns up at your place. It exhibits good impression of your property and its uniqueness, and at the same time enhances your front yard and lawn. Architects and homeowners are looking for new alternatives to create striking first impressions because of the stellar features a driveway can give to your property.
Outlining and designing front drives have proven as a great addition to any property. Materials used to lay the path also play a big role in the process as they tell the story of a driveway by bringing the aesthetics into play.
All these value additions bring grandness to your property by letting in nature as well. Recently, owners have been experimenting with materials used in the driveway, such as gravel, crushed stones, concrete and asphalt.
These materials have been good choices for years, but a modern house needs a sturdy, versatile and flexible driveway. It should be able to handle even the extreme wear and tear by any off-road vehicles that you or your friends could possess and still lay strong.
Serpentine is an option which comes to mind when we talk about sturdiness, versatility and flexibility. It provides you all these features in addition to the neutral texture it inherits. It would not be wrong to say that “What marble is to kitchen countertops, serpentine is to driveways”. It not only promises longevity, which is quintessential for a driveway, but also offer a sense of welcome and a visual appeal to come closer to your property. Serpentine is naturally occurring stone formed at extreme depths in the ocean. Magma escaping through cracks in the ocean floor at temperatures exceeding 500°c is cooled swiftly to yield this deep green stone. It is either found plain, or having a distinct strong white or light green veining pattern, and gives a neutral grey tone appearance in its outdoor finishes when dry.
Chemically, Serpentine is a magnesium silicate based stone. This makes it more acid and abrasion resistant than calcite based stones/minerals like marble. Serpentine also contains trace amounts of metallic compounds, which cause brilliant reflections that give it a vibrant look unlike other stones.
Physically, it is a high density and high hardness material, close to zero rate of moisture absorption, which is a desirable aspect for outdoor applications. As a surfacing material, it has greater acid resistance, more hardness and less porosity when compared to most types of granites. These properties coupled with its high bending strength make serpentine an excellent choice for exterior applications. Serpentine can be used for pools, driveways, facade cladding, barbeque counters, etc., in a variety of semi polished and rough finishes like sandblasted, bush-hammered, honed, etc.