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Gardening with Stone

dry stacked retaining wall

11 years ago

I have been researching on how to build a dry stacked stone wall. It seems not too difficult for myself as I am a beginner. I have one concern and that is which way should the wall taper so as to prevent the wall from being push over by the pressure of the soil behind it? I have read about how to stack the wall both ways and I see the merit in both ways. Please help me decide which way is the best to have a wall that won't fall over.

tortugo

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Comments (2)

karin_mt
11 years ago
The wall should be widest at the base and will taper toward the top. This is true if it is a freestanding wall or a retaining wall. In the case of a retaining wall it is especially important to have the face of the wall leaning in toward the hillside. This is called the wall's "batter."

Happy stacking!
dvmak
9 years ago
Building a dry stacked wall to run along a driveway. It will only be 20" high but it's on an incline. Most of what I read says to create steps when building on an incline but this is 200' long and about 25% incline so it would be stepped almost every 5 feet to maintain level and still have 20" hieight.
Is it required to step or can a dry stacked low wall just sit in the natural incline?
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