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Now extended for the rest of the UK

4,361 building stones recorded across Britain

Three billion years
of geology, at street level.

Every wall, column and cathedral step in Britain came out of the ground somewhere. We have mapped 4,361 of them. One is a Bromley street monument cut from Lewisian gneiss, the oldest rock in Britain.

4,361stone records

2,831buildings & sites

9°of latitude covered

Explore the map Submit a location you have spotted

the stone St Paul’s Cathedral, London Portland Stone Upper Jurassic, about 150 million years · from the Isle of Portland, Dorset See the record →
the stone Tower Bridge, London Cheesewring Granite 287 million years · from Liskeard, Cornwall See the record →
the stone Marischal College, Aberdeen Kemnay Granite 457 million years · from Kemnay, Aberdeenshire See the record →
the stone Houses of Parliament, London Anston Stone Permian, about 270 million years · from Anston, South Yorkshire See the record →
the stone National Museum of Scotland, Edinburgh Clashach Sandstone Permian, about 270 million years · from Clashach Quarry, Moray See the record →
the stone Westminster Abbey, London Chilmark Stone Upper Jurassic, about 150 million years · from Vale of Wardour, Wiltshire See the record →
The whole collection 4,358 records across Britain Every site we hold, plotted. Densest in the City of London, where the survey began. Open the map →

Where would you like to start?

The collection works at very different speeds.

Five minutes

Go back a few hundred million years

Whatever street you are on, there is probably stone within a few minutes of you that was once a tropical seabed, a desert dune or molten rock. Have a look before you carry on.

Your location is used once, to sort the list. It is not stored.

Or open the map →

An afternoon

Studying geology

All 164 stone types →

A project

Researching

4,361georeferenced records
164named stone types
2,831buildings and places
87published sources cited

Reading and references →

Walk through deep time

Britain's building stones run from Precambrian granite to rock laid down long after the dinosaurs. Each era below opens its most-recorded stone.

Precambrian 4600–539 mya Rapakivi granite 60 records Cambrian 539–487 mya Welsh slate 13 records Ordovician 487–443 mya Borrowdale 1 record Silurian 443–419 mya Peterhead granite 194 records Devonian 419–359 mya Shap granite 50 records Carboniferous 359–299 mya York stone 77 records Permian 299–252 mya Larvikite 209 records Triassic 252–201 mya Radyr stone 35 records Jurassic 201–145 mya Portland stone 490 records Cretaceous 145–66 mya Flint 94 records Cenozoic 66–now mya Travertine 41 records

oldest → youngest · not to scale each tile searches the collection for that era's most-recorded stone

Browse by where you are

The places the survey has covered most closely, by nearest station.

All 366 places →

186 Bangor 121 Leeds 104 Birmingham New Street 89 Green Park 88 Bank 82 Charing Cross 69 Llanfairpwllgwyngyll 68 Manchester Piccadilly

The most thoroughly recorded places

1 Chingford Mount Cemetery 23 records 2 St Giles Square Seating, London 19 records 3 HSBC Bank 16 records 4 Albert Memorial, Kensington 12 records 5 Peterloo Memorial, Manchester 12 records

The far ends of the collection

Northernmost · 58.17°N

Ardvreck Castle

A ruined keep on Loch Assynt, Sutherland. Three records here.

Southernmost · 49.97°N

Tregullas Farm Shop

Near the Lizard, Cornwall. Two records here.

Oldest · Archaean

Bromley Millennium Rock

Lewisian gneiss, the oldest rock in Britain, in a south London street. Nineteen separate records here.

Spotted something we have missed?

Every record here came from someone stopping to look. Submit yours in two minutes.

Submit a location