The Complete Handbook of Lawn Ornaments & Garden Sculptures

From a 50-pound concrete gnome to a twelve-foot fiberglass stag, lawn ornaments and garden sculptures are a multi-billion-dollar category that spans the divide between home decor and public art. Yet the people who work with them professionally - landscape installers, garden center buyers, event rental managers, and serious collectors - have never had a comprehensive reference that treats the subject with the seriousness it deserves. This handbook changes that.

Inside, you will find a systematic breakdown of the materials that matter (cast stone, precast concrete, fiberglass, powder-coated steel, and resin), the specifications that determine durability and value, and the installation methods that keep sculptures upright through frost heave, high winds, and heavy foot traffic. Master chapters on troubleshooting cover cracking, spalling, fading, rust, and biological growth, with step-by-step remediation techniques. A dedicated business section examines the real economics of retail, wholesale, rental, and restoration services, including how to value inventory and price labor.

Written in neutral, practical prose without marketing gloss, this is the handbook that should be on the desk of every buyer, installer, and reseller in the garden ornament trade. It is the difference between guessing and knowing, between a repair call and a job done right the first time.