Vol. 9 No. 6 - September/October 2009

Polishing worked wonders when artisans set out to restore an almost-century-old, flaw-riddled floor for a shopping arcade.

Known for their one-plus-one application process, epoxies promise adhesion, hardness, chemical resistance and versatility. Add color chips or metallic pigments, and they can be beautiful too.

When a city, school or government chooses to spend a little extra money on decorative concrete, it demonstrates civic pride — and makes that lobby, city pool or roadside a little easier on the eyes.

From crushed liquor bottles to melted bits and jelly beans, aggregate made from recycled glass is making artisans see green.

The most profitable decorative concrete jobs are usually the ones that are kept simple. Let's run through some entry-level stamping to get you started

The polished concrete industry has been plagued with a slew of maintenance systems that confuse and aggravate end users of polished concrete. Many suppliers of tools, equipment, chemicals and cleaning products rush to offer systems of maintenance, none of them adequately tested or proven.

Take a look at some of the most common myths, mistakes, and just plain wrong practices the decorative concrete industry has embraced as commonplace.

In concrete construction, as in society today in general, being green is hip. And part of being green includes recycling. Recycling materials: Collapsed L.A. freeways are demolished, stripped of reinforcing steel, and crushed, to rise again as an aggregate component in their replacements.

Many companies might have been satisfied with creating a successful coating system that has steadily gained in popularity. Wilmer Rowe, chief chemist of HP Spartacote LLC, is cut from a different cloth. Taking inspiration from some of the staining exhibits at World of Concrete, he began working toward creating stains that would integrate with HP Spartacote's polyaspartics.

Dust control is a hot topic these days. We compiled a list of some of the dust control equipment on the market that can help on any decorative concrete job.

This working Roman aqueduct, completed in the fall of 2005 for a home in Dove Canyon, Calif., wasn't built in a day.

Four manufacturers of concrete resurfacing and repair products took on the challenge presented by the Operative Plasterers & Cement Masons International Association (OPCMIA) Local 528 last July in Seattle.

Decorative epoxies for colorful garage floors burst onto the scene in the 1970s, when applicators began to saturate chemical-resistant epoxy coatings with colored vinyl chips. These floors went out of style for a while, but General Polymers director of floor coatings Lonnie Salyers says they are making a comeback, and not just in garages.

Harry Gressette of Grescon Construction LLC in Charleston, S.C., puts enough glass in his concrete each year to fill two tractor trailers. So he knows the ins and outs of exposed glass aggregate.