Albion Stone, Hutton Stone, Lundhs, Paye, Polycor and The Stonemasonry Company have joined together to form The Stone Collective. With the view to 'educate and inspire the built environment community about the power of stone', those involved are pioneering stone as the 21st-century's low carbon, load-bearing material. 

This May, The Stone Collective will sponsor a Material Futures stream at the Footprint+ conference – an event dedicated to promoting decarbonisation in the built environment. During the London event, members of The Stone Collective will be delivering seminars including:

Towards a new stone architecture
Pierre Bidaud, Natalia Petovka (TBC) and Michael Poultney
Since architects Martorell, Bohigas, Macklay and engineer Peter Rice built the 1992 Pavilion of the Future for the Seville World Expo from granite, what has changed in the use of stone in modern buildings? During the last 30 years updated systems and technologies have enabled the development of new stone building typologies. From a simple brick to highly engineered prefabricated pre-tensioned system, stone has proven its versatility, efficiently addressing pressing issues of the over consumption of energy.
 
A perpetual virtuous cycle
Robert Greer, Marcus Paine, Thor-Anders Lundh Håkestad and Valerie Bergeron 
From extraction to use, stone is a low environmental impact material. Ready to use, affordable, plentiful and easily adapted for reuse, stone is more relevant than ever. At the heart of stone construction there is a very low carbon footprint, with no heating/cooking process required, very little water needed, with a nose to tail approach including all the wonky bits for a 100% yield of the extracted material.

Footprint+ runs from 8-9 May at Old Billingsgate, London. For more information, visit: footprintplus.com