Vol. 5 No. 5 - October/November 2005

Winter’s on its way! It’s time to think about adding hearths and fireplace surrounds to your decorative concrete offerings

Tough, quick to set, and low in solvents, polyureas require only one coat and get the job done fast.

Ideas for what to do — or not to do — with cracks in overlays.

The annual meeting of the American Society of Concrete Contractors, held in Denver in September, was a showplace of what can go wrong — by design.

Although LEED credits aren’t yet available for polished concrete, it’s “green” as can be.

Installing foundations keeps this company grounded. Decorative concrete allows it to soar.

When blueprinting the process of forming cast-on-site counters, an important detail that's overlooked, is using the right material for the job.

A primer on accelerators and their use in decorative concrete. Accelerators are one of the most popular kinds of chemical admixtures. Like water reducers, retarders and plasticizers, when added to a concrete batch either immediately before or during mixing.

Kemiko products were used by architectural greats such as Frank Lloyd Wright before decorative concrete even had a name. The company continues to thrive and grow with the times.

Tim Higginson is not just a decorative concrete sales manager, he's also an enthusiast incorporating many concrete design features both inside and outside of his home.

Architect Bjorn Ollner met Gary Jones while they were both working on a pirate museum in the Bahamas (and if you know Gary, that doesn't seem like an odd place to find him). Ollner started his career in Sweden designing free-form concrete houses.

Wagman plastic blades leave a hard, polished finish up to the standards of steel, but without the dark burnish marks that tend to show up when steel spins against concrete.

DP-600 Concrete Repair products from 3M offer a fast way for concrete repair people to get their fill.

West End Commons is a new 91-unit loft development in Oakland, Calif. The two- and three-story townhouses have office space on the ground floor, with living space in the upper levels. Pettigrew’s company, Diamond D Concrete, won the subcontract to clean and clear-coat 40,000 square feet of concrete slab floors.

Most cracks in a substrate will telegraph through overlays if not prepared properly, so spend the extra time and dollars to prep the area correctly. If you repair problem areas prior to installing an overlay you will minimize the chances of cracks in your overlay.