There are a number of fountain dealers available - it all depends on your location and your budget. If you are looking for some high end options you can try the link posted below however you will need a professional installer to get most of them in. Cheers Steve Here is a link that might be useful: water fountain and cast stone dealer

Hello everybody, I'm new here :o) I was interested in reading how these moulds were made. I use a slightly different technique for both the silicone skin, and the mother mould. Here's what I do, just in case anyone wants to experiment. Names of products may be slightly different, as I'm not in the US. I use ordinary clear silicone - the type you buy for sealing anything outdoors. 1. Fill a basin with warm water, add a very good squirt of dishwashing liquid and mix well. 2. Put silicone dispenser in caulk gun, cut off top, and squeeze straight into the soapy water. 3. Using your hands (you can use rubber gloves, but I never bother) gather up the silicone mass, lift it onto your master (the object you want to make a mould from) and press down well all over. Make sure it gets pressed into all depressions. 4. Dip your hands back into the soapy water if the silicone starts to stick to them. Smooth over the outside of the mould with wet soapy hands. 5. Leave overnight to cure. Case-mould I use Fine Casting Plaster, which is much the same as Plaster of Paris. Large bags of it can be bought in large hardware and builders' suppliers. It will perish if the bag is left open, so buy only enough for your needs. I use hessian scrim or plasterer's scrim. Small rolls of plasterer's scrim will do the job OK, and are easy to source. Hope these tips are useful...

Thanks everyone for offering your pieces of advice--I really appreciate them all. It is also good to hear that Quickcrete is what you use to make up the bulk of the stepping stones, although I think Dena might have used leaf casting material in hers since she was essentially making her leaf castings directly in her stepping stones as opposed to incorporating already cast finished leaves into newly made stones. Hope I got that right Dena. I have some leaves I have made previously that are already finished--painted and polyurethaned. I made some leaves this fall that have still got to be finished so yes I am using prefinished leaves in my stones so that is why I am concerned about getting the Quickcrete on the surface of the finished leaves. It might be next spring before I actually get around to making the stepping stones--the weather has gone from the 80s to the 50s in the span of one week. Perhaps it is just a temporary temp. change. Dena, your leaf stepping stones are fantastic looking. BB, I really like your tufa container also. I too want to know what you used in it to get the coloration in the container. As I said previously, I have been making cast leaves for quite a while now and have probably made over 40 or so. Most were given as gifts, others were sold, and quite a few are in my yard/garden. I have also made a few tufa containers and bowls and want to try my hand at a few other things like grots when time permits. I have a few pictures of some of the leaves and troughs I have made linked below if you are interested. I am sure there are other pictures of them in my Photobucket account, but if you are interested, you can look through the yard pictures and scan for them. Once again, thanks for the help! Here is a link that might be useful: Miguel's stuff

Susan, Here in Florida there are many cast stone manufacturers. I've installed quite a bit of it from various companies. I would advise you to purchase from a source as close to you as you can (breakage, design). Make sure you have profile drawings showing exact dimensions that you want if you aren't using in stock pieces. Talk to your installer, most of us can look at a piece and tell if the molds have seen their better days, etc. Area masons sometimes know more than the architects, designers. After all we can usually tell whose shop it came from by looking at it. Hope this helps, Brix