Dry lay
See the whole lot together, before it ships
What it is
A dry lay is the material laid out flat and unfixed — no adhesive, no substrate, nothing permanent — so it can be reviewed as a single surface rather than as a stack of individual pieces.
Natural stone is not a manufactured product. Two slabs cut from the same block can differ, and a lot that passes piece-by-piece inspection can still be wrong taken as a whole. Colour range, vein continuity and finish only become assessable once the pieces are adjacent and under the same light.
We attend the dry lay on your behalf, record it, and report against your specification — so the decision to accept or reject the lot is made on evidence, at the point where changing it still costs nothing but time.
See the full inspection process
On the ground
What we check across the layout.
-
Check 1: Colour and tonal range
Individual slabs can each sit inside the specification and still read as two different materials once they are side by side. Laid out together, the true spread of the lot is visible at a glance.
-
Check 2: Veining and pattern continuity
Vein direction, density and scale are compared across the whole lot rather than slab by slab, so a break in the pattern is caught before the material is cut.
-
Check 3: Bookmatch and sequence
Where a bookmatch or a sequenced run is specified, the pairs are opened and the running order is confirmed and numbered against the layout drawing.
-
Check 4: Finish consistency
Polish, honing and brushing are checked across the lot under the same light. Variation between production batches is easiest to see when the pieces are adjacent.
-
Check 5: Dimensions and squareness
Thickness, edge straightness and squareness are measured across the layout, not sampled from the top of a crate, so calibration drift over a production run is visible.
-
Check 6: Defects that only show at scale
Fissures, filler, patch repairs and resin lines can be inconspicuous on a single slab and obvious across a floor. The layout is the point at which they surface.
In the yard
What the layout reveals.
The record
A layout you can approve without being in the country.
Every piece is numbered and photographed in position, with overall frames of the full layout and detail frames of anything we have flagged. The report ties each number back to the specification, so the material can be signed off remotely — and so the same numbering survives crating, shipping and installation.
If the lot is rejected, that record is also what the conversation with the supplier is conducted on.
Get in touch
Ask for a dry lay before the lot is crated.
Tell us the material, the supplier and the layout you have specified. We'll tell you what a dry lay on that lot would involve.