After five years on Clendaniel Pond Road, Ancient Art Stone has moved from its corner of a Lincoln to a home on the highway.
“The community really supported us when we were in Lincoln, and I hope they still will,” co-owner Eric Wilber said.
In the first week of January, after more than a year of preparation, the business opened its new home, at 1625 Bay Road – just a few hundred feet up the highway from Hertrich’s of Milford.
Ancient Art specializes on custom-made countertops made from natural or engineered rock, from quartz to granite, marble, artificial “engineered rock” and volcanic stone. Each piece is laser-cut and hand-polished.
“Everything you can do by hand, we do by hand,” Wilber said.
All the material the company has is stored next to the showroom, so instead of picking from a pattern, customers can look at the full-sized stone and pick not just what material they want but exactly which part they want to use.
“You could look at the slab and see a particular pattern you want to make sure you get,” Wilber said. “Or sometimes a customer will say ‘I like all of it except this one part – can you work around that?’ and we can check to make sure before anything gets started.”
Even with hundreds of pieces to choose from on the lot, Wilber said, sometimes a customer has something specific in mind and can’t find it at Ancient Art. He doesn’t let that stop him.
“We can get different materials shipped in, and on a pretty regular basis,” he said. “If it turns out that it’s not what they’re looking for, they (the shipper) just take it away when they’re here for another delivery.”
That touch even extends to delivery. Although moving a 15-foot slab of rock can get unwieldy, to say the least, Wilber said he makes it a point to deliver his product in one piece.
“You don’t want a seam running down your counter,” he said. “We’ve used a crane to bring the stone in through a window, we’ve had a dozen people carry it up a flight of stairs – whatever it takes.”
While they specialize in countertops, Ancient Art has far more than that available. The business also sells hardwood and tile floors, kitchen and bathroom fixtures and marble décor.
For more information, call Ancient Art Stone at 335-1199.
Milford, Del. —
