Creating a Tuscan Feel on Your Patio: The Pillars
August 26, 2009
I love trying new things so it occurred to me one day that my patio was pretty bland. I had the usual, a patio table, a few plants, etc. But it gets hot here and I was longing for a cool get-away where I could relax and feel like I was in a different place. That is when it occurred to me that using a Tuscan décor in my patio area may be something that I could do that wouldn’t be too expensive and would help me to escape.
I began with my patio cover. Like a lot of people, I have a wood patio cover. It was probably supposed to be an arbor in the “old” days, but has since been covered and is solely used to provide shade. I called a friend of mine who is a professional painter to see what my options were. His immediate suggestion, after hearing my idea, was to rip the sucker down and build something that would be more appropriate. But, I’m on a budget so I went with plan B.
What I notice when looking at a Tuscan style outdoor décor is that they use lots of rock, pillars, and heavy wood. Of course, the areas that this décor is used in allow for that kind of space usage and I don’t have that much space. So the question was how to create the “effect” of rock, pillars and heavy wood minus the actual space.
I started with the pillars. Like most people, my patio has four 4x4s’ that hold up the roof of my frame. They are ugly, painted white to match the rest of the patio frame and don’t show much promise in the “pillar” department. I knew that I didn’t want to tear them down and start over. I also knew that I couldn’t afford to replace them with really cool rock. So, I moseyed down to my local Home Supply store and started looking for some alternatives. When I go to my local home supply store the guys on the floor always cringe when they see me coming because they know that I’m going to either ask a question they have never heard of, or I’m going to buy a product to use for something that it was not intended. I look at redecorating as sort of an artistic outlet so unless a person sees the possibilities in a product; they are going to get annoyed with me pretty fast. So, I ask the yard guy about water resistant fake rock that will adhere to wood and explained that I was going to “create” a pillar. This was not a question he was prepared for. But, I did eventually find a great alternative.
You know that rock that is used on the front of new homes that is laid into the stucco and looks real? Well what I found is that you can buy it in different shapes and colors and here is how you make a pillar that won’t rot your wood.
- Make sure that you get enough of the fake rock fit your whole pole. You also want to make sure that each rock fits flush to the wood. What I wound up doing was piecing the rock and numbering each piece so I could put them back easily.
- Staple chicken wire all around your pole. This is going to hold your stucco. I’m not sure why this is important, the professional painter I asked told me it was.
- Get regular stucco that they use on houses and put it on the pole over the chicken wire. Don’t wait for it to dry.
- Put some stucco on each rock then “glue” it to the pole. There were a couple of places where I had to use duct tape to keep the rock to the pole until it dried.
- After it is dry use grout or stucco in the crevices between the rocks. I used stucco and just added a little brown paint to get the aged effect that I wanted.
That was it. It was pretty easy actually, just time consuming. But, I’m well on the way to my Tuscan style patio and my pillars look great.
