A memorial that incorporates one individual portrait, inscription and a choice of 3 backgrounds:
• Leatherette
• Country
• Beach

Features:
• Provide one personal photo (minimum size 300 dpi)
• Choose from four edges: Rock, Woodgrain, Bevel or Straight
• Inscript in any font
• Add flat relief emblems
• Choose a Contemporary Border
• Antique Finish

Introducing the most cost effective way to beautify a memorial before or after its been installed. Tecstone's BLING (Beautiful Life Insignias iN Granite) are 100% handcarved granite designs that affix to the stone via epoxy and pins.

Available in the following colors: Autumn Black * Autumn Mist * Bahama Blue * Black Supreme * Blue Pearl * Butterfly Blue * Cats Eye * China Pink * Civil Gray * Cloud Gray * Dakota Mahogany * Emerald Pearl * Flash Black * Galaxy Black * India Mahogany * India Red * Multicolor Red * Newbury Gray * Paradiso * Salisbury Pink * White Marble

Monuments can be sandblasted with flat carvings or shape carvings.

Flat carvings produce cut-lines consistent with the flat plane of the monument’s surface. Shape carvings enhance an art component with a sculptured-3D effect, creating depth and contours.

Although the serp top is the most popular shape, other common shapes are available. Here are examples of some of the simpler ones. Remember that these may add additional costs and/or delivery times to an order.

For greater contrast between lettering, carvings, and the surrounding stone, there is a process called tinting, which is similar to painting the stone with a complimentary color.

While many variations exist, common monuments can be classified into one of four major groupings.

The serpentine (or serp) top monument is by far the most common shape. What makes it so popular?

Since the mid 20th Century, this design has skyrocketed in popularity and now outsells all other upright shapes combined. Having such a simple design has allowed memorial producers and wholesalers to provide consumers a lot of bang for their buck while dramatically shortening the process it once took to memorialize a loved one. And further, the relatively large polished faces give the consumer plenty of space to use the modern decorating techniques which were not available on the memorials of yesteryear. If you are a consumer considering a purchase of an upright memorial, be sure to consult with your monument counselor as there may be regulations or prohibitions in your family cemetery that may limit your choices.

What makes a serp top standard?

While serp top monuments all have the trademark “hump” in their top, there are certain characteristics that are considered standard. These characteristics relate to the height of the hump (called the drop), the position of the hump, and the shape of the ends. Choosing a monument with standard characteristics generally results in lower cost and/or faster delivery time. Standard characteristics of serp top Dies (or Tablets) are shown on the right half of this page.

While bases don't have the prominence that dies do, they are nonetheless important. Lean about them here.

Virtually all upright monuments use at least one supporting base. Those that don’t are called “Monolithic”.

The simplest base style has a polished flat top (PFT) and balanced rock pitched (BRP) sides.

Bases can be “dressed up” by adding polished margins, drop washes, name chamfers, or beveled fronts.

Although most bases have square corners with straight sides, some are now being produced with rounded ends and some are even being shaped with curved edges.

Some monuments even have more than one base. In such cases, the upper base is referred to as the “sub-base” and the lower one is called the “bottom base”.

Monuments can be finished in a variety of ways. Like any industry, the monument industry has its own lingo used to describe its products. Short definitions of the common monument finishes are listed below.

POLISHED SURFACES are smooth and shiny. After granite blocks are quarried, they are sawn into slabs of the desired thickness. The sawn surfaces are then polished firstly with a coarse abrasive, then successively finer abrasives until perfectly smooth. The final shiny finish is achieved with a buffing process that uses an extremely fine abrasive. Most monuments have at least some polished areas.

ROCK PITCHED are rough, rock surfaces that have been pitched by hand using a hammer and chisel to achieve a finished, consistent rock effect.

SAWN SIDES are smooth, but may have lines in the finish from the saw blade, and are generally used only for surfaces that will not be visible after the monument is installed.

HONED SURFACES are surfaces that been partially polished. They are not shiny but are very smooth. They are rarely used - their primary application is the provide decorative contrast to polished areas.

STIPPLED surfaces appear as small white “dimples” caused by stunning the surface with a small pointed tool.

STEELED SURFACES are smooth surfaces that have been sandblasted using steel shot, which gives a bright, white, textured finish.

DUSTED SURFACES are smooth surfaces that have been sandblasted using abrasive grit. It is a more common treatment than steeling, and returns a similar texture, but it is not as bright. Both dusting and steeling are used for exposed monument surfaces where polished or rock pitched effects are not desired. A very common application for both treatments is the contrasting panel behind sandblasted lettering on memorials.

Common Monument Finish Abbreviations
BRP         =   Balanced Rock Pitched
P1            =   Polished 1 surface only
P2, BRP       =    (Used for Dies) Polished front and back, top and ends are rock pitched.
P3, BRP       =   (Used for Dies) Polished front, back, and top with rock pitched ends.
P5 (or AP)   =   All 5 exposed surfaces are polished. AP stands for “All Polished”
PFT BRP      =   (Used for Bases and Grass Markers) Polished flat top with remaining exposed sides being rock pitched.
PFT SS   =   (Used for Grass Markers) Polished flat top with remaining exposed sides being sawn.
PSF              =    (Used for Slants) The front slant face is polished.

Laser etching involves manipulating an image (photograph or other) and having that image engraved directly onto black granite with a laser machine. The result is both photo-realistic and highly detailed. It is important to note that the quality of the etched image greatly depends on the quality of the image we receive. Low resolution images and blurry images will result in low quality etchings. Using the industry's latest large format laser etching machine.

We offer both color* and B/W etchings from your supplied photographs and pictures, or original designs and scenes created speciﬁcally to meet your needs from our own art department.

Color etchings are available only for spots and scenes, not portraits.