Plastic fantastic building materials

Instead of laying individual bluestones, cobbles or bricks, a contractor can simply pour a slab of concrete and then emboss and tint its surface to make it look like any one of those far more expensive materials.

"Just make sure your installer hides some expansion joints in the seams between the stamped stones, which will help control cracks in the concrete," says contractor David Tyson of Charlotte, N.C., whose home has a stamped concrete patio.

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