Fabricator Focus: Kopelov Cut Stone Inc.

“We met the architect at a trade show, and he immediately focused on our traditional limestone mock-up with a lug sill,” Labe Kopelov explains. “We were also open to doing back-cut corners, rather than miter joints. The project was approximately 2,000 ft³ of Indiana limestone; we like those types of projects, and they’re pretty much what we’re suited for.”

Click photo to enlargeAs proud as he is of the work the company turns out, Kopelov is just as proud of his son and their working relationship. Currently, he and Kino are able to handle the work by running extra hours, and to keep additional employees would probably require an expansion of the shop’s repertoire into other kinds of stone fabrication and possibly installation.

“I’ve learned from experience that this compromises the quality of our specialized niche, which is stone replacement for historic structures,” says the father. “Plus, you’d be surprised how much work we can get done. We just know each other so well, I can’t even begin to express how close we are. We just know each other’s moves, so things flow quite smoothly in our shop.”

And, he believes both men are well-suited to continuing in historic stone restoration.

“We love historic restoration, mainly because we’re good at it,” Labe Kopelov says. “We want to work with quality minded restoration contractors and architects from around the country, ones who want to collaborate with a stonecutter who monitors every detail of the fabrication process.”

Kopelov says he’s also looking for people who understand there’s a cost to such quality. He prefers to bid jobs where the specs are crystal clear, and they don’t bid on a cubic-foot or square-foot price with allowances that could lower the quality to match the so-called going price.

“Normally, we’ll negotiate a project once we’ve offered estimated unit prices for selected stone elements,” Kopelov concludes. “We’ll also support doing a project in phases to match the budget instead of lowering the quality in order to do the whole project at one time.

“I truly feel that historic restoration is about relationships and creating a team with an architect, engineer, contractor, fabricator/supplier and installer who are all working toward the same goal: a quality finished project.”

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