Only 27 years old, stonemason Jason Webb has been self employed in his business Webb Stone Work for the past nine years.

Jason constructs feature walls, retaining walls, fireplaces, chimneys, cellars, front facades and stairs, working in both dry and mortared granite, sandstone, hardhead, slate and limestone. He also builds water features and can landscape artificial creeks, do paving and create ornamental features such as stone spheres. Recently Jason has expanded his work to include full fire brick wood fired ovens.

Work takes Jason, who lives in Rushworth, all over Victoria and NSW, as far afield as Dubbo and Narromine or Hastings, Flinders and Shoreham. He sometimes travels up to 350km a day while working on projects.

His three permanent staff include a General Manager who takes care of the administration and personnel, a contractor and one labourer. Jason considers his employees and himself "make a great team".  "We try to establish a good understanding of exactly what the client wants and then we deliver it,'' Jason said.

Although Jason does build complete homes, he is finding a huge demand for stonework features and currently these comprise most of his work.

"Each job is unique, either in a different area or using a completely different stone,'' Jason said.
The creative and artistic aspects can be a challenge but Jason enjoys finding solutions to problems.

"We try and nut it out,'' he said. The natural texture of stone appeals to Jason and the knowledge that it will never change colour and will stay the same forever is reassuring.

"Piecing the stones together not unlike a jigsaw puzzle is part of the fun of it,'' Jason said.

"It's not a pallet of bricks which are all the same, each stone is different. But it can be finnicky work.''

Jason sources materials from quarries at Glenrowan, Castella and Hillview, or sometimes handpicks from the ground.

"The biggest reward is being able to stand back and look at the job after it is completed and to see your work as the feature of the home,'' Jason said.

"Positive feedback keeps you getting up and going to work in the morning and makes it all worthwhile.''