About Drystone Joe
About Drystone Joe: Educator. Empowerer. Craftsman.
My mission is to empower & inspire others by teaching drystone masonry, to sell retail stone products, and to build drystone masonry installations. I leave a mark on history by helping others make theirs.
About Drystone Joe Teaching and Consulting:
I am an educator of drystone masonry, and also have a passion for teaching the best known practices of drystone masonry. Since 2001, I have lead many educational stone masonry programs throughout the U.S. These range from one-hour presentations to 70-hour hands-on workshops. I’ve also led 3-day to month-long stone masonry artist residencies in K-12 schools and colleges since 2004. I use stonemasonry to explore math, science, art, social studies, and language arts. Furthermore, I am a consultant on municipal, commercial, and residential drystone masonry projects.
About Dry Stone Joe Design and Build:
Since 1997, I have built, restored, and designed drystone masonry landscape installations throughout the United States and in Scotland. I learned the craft during its revival in Kentucky in the mid-1990’s. During the last 29 years, I’ve worked with a wide variety of stone and landscape circumstances. I design, build and repair drystone landscape features using the best known practices for durability according to the Dry Stone Walling Association and the UNESCO World Heritage Sites. As a result, I am building stonemasonry features to last as long as possible.
About Drystone Joe Astronomy Efforts:
In addition, I design and build stonemasonry landscape features that align with a range of astronomy. This includes the sunrise and sunset for winter and summer solstices and equinox, the moonrise and moonset for lunar standstill, and the cardinal directions. I also embed the math of astronomy into landscape features. Thus, 18.6 to indicate lunar standstill years, 29.53 for the synodic lunar cycle days, 13 for the lunar cycles per year, 365 for days of the year, 23.44 for tilt of earth’s axis, etc. Since 4/3 of stonemasons struggle with math, I have to use tape measures for this aspect. Astronomy is so far out!
About Dry Stone Joe Masonry Retail:
I also sell retail items related to drystone masonry. These include my stone carvings, a drystone masonry manual I wrote, and a three-dimensional stone arch puzzle I designed and patented.
About Drystone Joe Certifications and 3rd Degrees:
In 1999, I earned a bachelor’s degree in Appalachian studies from Berea College. Then I earned a master’s degree in vocational education from the University of Kentucky in 2001. In 2011, I earned grades 6-12 social studies teaching license from the University of North Carolina. I also earned certification as a drystone masonry instructor in 2001, then again in 2016 from the Drystone Walling Association of Great Britain. I earned two levels of drystone masonry fence building certification, first in 2001 in Kentucky, then in Scotland in 2006, also from the Drystone Walling Association of Great Britain.
