Staining & Coloring Concrete

This elegant color combination is the way to go for a simple design that calls for a two-toned color scheme.

There is a famous paperback called “The Elements of Style” by Strunk and White. Many writers treasure it as a guide to writing clearly and succinctly while avoiding common grammatical errors. The handbook itself is a model of clarity.

Beginning painters get so excited by the smorgasbord of shapes, colors and textures they have been learning that they often try to put every trick they know into each of their paintings. This leads to a hodge-podge with no focus.

Decorative concrete lends color, resonance and beauty to the African Cemetery Memorial, completed last year at Higgs Beach in Key West, Fla.

Control joints are cuts placed into the concrete at the time of pouring, or shortly after, to control random cracking in concrete. This works by creating a weakened area in the slab — concrete cracks follow the path of least resistance.

Surface preparation is a commonly used term in the decorative concrete industry. An argument can be made that it might even just be the most used term in the industry. We hear or read about it most often when dealing with overlays and stains. Grind, scarify, acid etch, etc.

With a subtle two-level texture coat and a wild 3-D geometric pattern, this staining technique delivers a unique, captivating concrete floor finish.

In the previous two articles, I discussed my bread-and-butter designs. I probably do one of those designs every other week and sometimes twice a week. They’re quick and easy once you become familiar with them. Practice drawing them on your warehouse floor a couple of times until you get used to the routine.

In his 68 years, Jim Vermillion has mastered many skills: military officer, airline pilot, inventor, seagoing kayak adventurer, business owner.

But he hasn’t been able to get the hang of retirement.

This luxe look is achieved by overlaying several super-thin coats of microtopping and dye, resulting in a finish with subtle depth and a sexy sheen.

Kevin Brown is a soft-spoken, humble-yet-accomplished man who got into the business of concrete work through his family. As he describes it, he knew from a young age that he wanted to follow in the family footsteps.

In 2011, the city of Carmel, Indiana, revamped its major roadway, the Keystone Parkway, as part of a multiphase project to lower the grade under six major intersections. This created new interchanges and no traffic lights for north-south traffic over a five-mile stretch, while six new roundabouts managed east-west traffic.

This simple recipe uses Proline’s Sand Canyon Dura-Color Hardener and their Seamless Designs Carpet Stamp. Two colors of EZ Tique were used to give the finish its mottled look.

Choosing integrally colored concrete offers lasting color and design options with the right materials, tools and techniques.

Cory Hanneman has put a lot of thought into developing a sales strategy for decorative concrete that involves, in his words, “raging against the big-box machine” and its road map of “massive selection and predictability.”

Mark Womack of Monster Constructors in Fort Worth, Texas, inadvertently became something of an expert when two back-to-back clients asked him for concrete work that included fiber optic lights.

Integral color and color hardener are still the most common ways to tint concrete. But these days, the buzz is all about acid stain. Because the stain is the result of many individual chemical reactions, the tint is uneven — gloriously so. It can contain marbling, mottling and all kinds of variations in the base hue.

Decorative sealers are designed to provide a wide range of benefits. The top two are always protection and color enhancement. Safety, appearance, and performance (SAP) should be considered when determining what decorative sealer system to use.

Robert Salinas, 58, jokes that he has 50 years of concrete experience. That’s not too far off from the truth, because as a youngster he recalls helping to place concrete for the pool company his uncle and father worked at in San Antonio, Texas.

I’m not a fan of overlays unless they’re necessary, I continually compete against knockdown finish companies that prefer them. Most of my competition uses overlays on pool decks and patios no matter what. This gives me a unique spin to compete against them.

Mexico's decorative concrete construction industy lags behind the decorative industry in the United States, but staining and other techniques for coloring concrete are helping this contractor flourish south of the border.

When Christina Arnall signed up for Ben Ashby’s advanced countertop class in Las Vegas about four years ago, she had no idea it would lead to an epiphany. It began when Ashby introduced the group to his ½-inch admix being used to create a shower panel and they decided to color it blue.

The resort was buzzing with people talking about the improvements that were transforming the grounds and some of the facilities on the resort. From pools and walkways to countertops and floors, projects were conducted by seasoned professionals and completed by novices and decorative concrete veterans alike.