A hypertufa is a porous man-made rock that is built essentially using Portland cement with peat moss, and perlite or vermiculite. It is based from tufa, a naturally occurring rock made from a precipitation of carbonate minerals. A hypertufa is incredibly light-weight and can be further reinforced with the addition of sand and nylon fiber mesh. And as it is very porous, a hypertufa is ideal for plant growth. As such, the majority of hypertufa projects are manufactured for gardening ornaments.
You can find unlimited possibilities for a hypertufa project, all you need to have, aside obviously from the ingredients, is a resourceful imagination and an appropriate mold. Molds are necessary to your hypertufa projects because they basically determine the end result of your project. You can use boxes, styrofoams, bowls, toys, balls, discs, plastic, metal and terra cotta containers as molds for your projects. Another good idea to get exceptional molds is to go through the junk that is lying in your own home. You may also produce your own molds if you want using wood, polystyrene foam used in house insulation, and Styrofoam. Use your imagination and be resourceful by combining different molds within a project. Just make sure that you look after your molds using release agents such as plastics, garbage bags, and lubricants, so that they won’t be damaged right after creating your hypertufa project.
The most common and easiest to create hypertufa project is a planter or trough. They are easy to make since the mold that you’ll require for that project can readily be found in the house, for example cardboard boxes, Styrofoam ice chests, plastic containers, and so on.
You can also build a hollow garden sphere as a hypertufa project. These garden spheres are excellent accessories as they look very classy and artsy. To do this project, you can use inflatable exercise balls and beach balls. You can also reinforce these spheres by adding hardware cloth strips around the ball just before applying the hypertufa mixture.
Another hypertufa project that can be created are stepping stone rocks for your lawn. You can use discs, plates or any flat objects as your mold for this kind of project. Furthermore, you should use a heavy and reinforced hypertufa mixture for this project as they should be sturdy if they are to be stepped upon.
Faux rocks and sculptures are also another possible hypertufa project. These type of projects are not as easy to make as you need to be very imaginative in the process of creating one, as some of the procedure differs from the common way. You also need to create your own molds for these types of project. However, these projects are the most rewarding ones to create, after you have successfully created them.