Allowing Your Marble to Age Gracefully

I can't tell you how often friends and clients ask me for a referral for someone to come to their home to polish or refinish their aging marble.  In true California youth-oriented style, everyone (alright, they're mostly women) wants to exfoliate the dull sheen to reveal the original smooth, shiny surface that they so enjoyed when the stone was first installed.  I hate to make so obvious an analogy, but ladies, you need to embrace the passage of time rather than resist it.  Your marble entryway has gotten to the state it's in by experiencing life: when it was new, it had a shiny finish; then it was walked over, skidded on, and treated like any other floor.  Why be upset that it's showing its age?

A real patina takes years to form, and cannot be successfully faked.  Think of the furniture experts on Antiques Roadshow who admonish people for refinishing old valuable pieces - it decreases the value tremendously.  In Italy, retail and food establishments almost always have counters and tables made with marble - not even granite, which is more durable - and it is never, ever refinished.  Italians have a way of facing the truth about aging, and wouldn't think to hone and polish a white or green marble counter top to give it the appearance of being new.  Staircases in many old houses, churches, and public buildings have a wonderful indentation in the middle of each marble step formed from centuries of foot traffic. I always look down when I climb Italian marble stairs, thinking of all of those who have preceded me and all who will come after I am gone.

I realize that our houses are not all palaces, but we need to learn to appreciate the beauty that lies beneath the surface and quit trying to stop the clock.  Brand-new and shiny is a lot of fun, but gracefully aged is much more interesting.

The Holy Stairs in Rome (slideshow of restoration)

Stairs to Cupola of St Peter's Basilica, Rome
Approximately 450 years young

Roman Travertine: Do you have a piece of the Colosseum?

If you've never seen it in person, you've seen it hundreds of times in pictures or in movies: The Flavian Amphitheater, commonly known as the Colosseum.  There are very few structures on this earth as old as  the Roman Colosseum, and, as it turns out, with as long a legacy.  Though the clashing of gladiators' swords and the roar of the bloodthirsty crowds have been long silent, Colosseum Stone is still being quarried in Tivoli, near Rome, and if you have any Italian travertine in your home, perhaps cladding your fireplace or covering your floors or countertops, you share a link with the ancient Roman world.

I know of no other place that manages to take my breath away no matter how many times I've seen it, and whenever I'm in Rome I make an effort to pay a visit, preferably via the subway.  When friends ask me about siteseeing in Rome, I tell everyone to make sure to take the subway Line B, exit "Colosseo" rather than a bus or taxi; the vision that beholds you after coming up the escalator from the dark subway and exiting the station is guaranteed to take your breath away.  The familiar arched colonnades of the massive structure appear directly in front of the station, larger even than you imagined it would be. As you cross the street to get closer, try to ignore the cheesy Roman Gladiator costumed men.  I wish we could rewind Italy back to the 80's before someone came up with the awful yet genius idea that the Disneyfication of their national treasures would line some pockets, but then I'm old-fashioned.

I remember wondering why there was a big bite missing from the Colosseum when I first saw it, and for some reason I thought it had suffered damage from WWII, which also explained the huge pock marks on the exterior facade.  I had pictured a big gun battle with the Italian army defending their monuments against the nasty German army who had no regard for a country's history.  I'm not sure what artillery I had in mind, nor where I got the idea that there was ever a battle in Rome during The War, but let that be a warning to anyone sending their kids to L.A. Unified.

As it turns out, the missing travertine from the Colosseum was pilfered not by enemies of Rome, but from the Romans themselves, some of whom, according to legend, may have been of the Papal persuasion. The Colosseum was damaged in earthquakes, but instead of repairing the ancient amphitheater, the travertine was salvaged to build palaces and churches throughout Rome.  In 1450, Pope Nicolas V ordered 2,500 cartloads of Colosseum Stone delivered to the ancient St. Peter's Basilica in order to make repairs to the original structure, but it's not known how much actually went into the Renaissance structure standing today once it was completed in 1655.  So there we have it: a beautiful basilica at one end of the city, and a fragmented amphitheater at the other - and, as usual when it comes to Italian design, it works.

Links:
Virtual Tour of St Peter's Basilica
The Roman Colosseum: Architectural Details and History

Snow in Rome: February, 2012