Cabela’s and the Rampart Range Metro District looked for an economical, yet visually pleasing retaining wall to wrap around the back of the outdoor sports retailer’s new Lone Tree, Colo., store. After reviewing renderings and onsite mock-ups, officials opted for a soil nail wall shoring system with a Columnar Basalt finish from Santa Ana, Calif.-based Boulderscape Inc.
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| Boulderscape crews placed 56,320 sq. ft. of structural and architectural shotcrete over a multi-tiered soil nail wall shoring system, saving Rampart Range Metro District $100,000-plus in construction costs. The contractor designs and casts retaining wall structures with architectural styling or geological motifs. |
Crews placed structural and architectural shotcrete in record time, allowing the construction of Cabela’s to proceed ahead of schedule. The system called for multi-tiered retaining walls, with heights ranging from 10-36 ft. and lengths from 250-720 ft. Structural and architectural shotcrete reached respective thicknesses of 8 inches and 2-6 inches. The wall face was carved, textured and stained to emulate columnar basalt by Boulderscape artisans, who each have over 2 million square feet of shotcrete-finishing experience. Cracks and crevices created in the face of the retaining walls were carved specifically to allow water to drain and eliminate moisture trapping.
Additional details were added to the walls to allow a natural-looking finish, among them an undulating wall top, plus trees and low-lying vegetation on wall terraces and at the structures’ base. Permanent earth-tone stains color the sculpted walls to blend with the environment.