Anyone ever built a flagstone patio?

Will it be covered? If not hire a professional. You don't want pooling water which you will get if you DIY

Paid a Mexican ground crew $2k to do mine and well worth the expense. I watched most of the build and it was some dirty, hard work. Also, there is an art to getting all of the stone arranged without big gaps. The guy in charge of that was an artist. Patio was awesome but I sold the house two years later so can't speak to durability over concrete.

Mine will not be covered.

Was yours laid over an existing concrete slab or started from dirt?

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why not pour concrete and have it etched and colored like its made out of flagstone?

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Because this:



Looks better than this:

Uh, no it doesnt.

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Because this:

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This.....if you do it yourself,
1. excavate 4" + the thickness of your flag (1 1/2" usually),
2.do a sub base of 2" of sand....lay weed matt/filter fabric on dirt before adding sand,
3.add filter fabric on top of sand and add 2" of Decomposed granite or ornamental gravel as show in the previous posters pic. (Ornamental gravel can be expensive....that looks like moss green granite in the pic which is super expensive. Decomposed granite is cheap, looks good and hardens to a very firm base.
4. lay flag.....this is where the art comes in to make it look good, if you use decomposed granite or gravel then you don't have to worry about getting a 2% slope for drainage as you would with a concrete sub base.
5. once flag is laid, fill in joints with decomposed granite or ornamental gravel. Orn Gravel will tend to stay loose and will come out of the joints a bit. DG mostly hardens and doesn't cause you to track much gravel into the house.

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Mine will not be covered.

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Was yours laid over an existing concrete slab or started from dirt?

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Mine is not covered and is laid over an existing concrete slab, with a fountain pool in the middle. Not much maintenance..

My in laws did it. They hate it now and wish they would have done concrete. Pooling water, mildew, hard to pressure wash, constant chipping of the stones, stubbed toes just to name a few. Maybe if it was covered they'd like it more, not sure though.

Yep... do exactly what Balls says, cept if you're lazy or an OT Baller, get someone else to do it for you!

Did mine three years ago using Gator Dust. Still looks great to this day. 3 inches of base and an inch of sand. You'll need 2 pallets of stone make sure they are big pieces at least 2 inches thick. You need to vibrate the gator dust into cracks and all will be fine make sure it's not going to rain.