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The primary design focus of the five year renovation of the J. Paul Getty Museum was to modernize the existing museum, which is a replica of a Roman villa buried in the eruption of Mount Vesuvius and breath new life using decorative concrete.
While hand-mudding vertical concrete projects is the preferred method for getting a working surface ready to be shaped and carved, for bigger jobs it’s not necessarily efficient.
Enter a spray system.
We here at Concrete Decor always welcome submissions of photos from concrete artisans around the world. When we received a particularly attractive batch from an artist in Argentina, we decided to share them with you.
Being in the construction industry his whole life, Dion Battles made the unsurprising leap to decorative concrete, specifically the vertical carving and theming part of the industry, after the nationwide recession hit the residential building industry hard in 2007.
Cabela’s, a national retailer of hunting, fishing and outdoor gear, designs its stores with elaborate dioramas of outdoor scenes teeming with life. Besides taxidermists, artists and landscapers, the chain has come to rely on the talents of decorative concrete professionals to help bring these displays to life.
If you’re one of the growing number of contractors making the move from horizontal to vertical, this may be one of your first questions.
In Part 1, we showed how to construct a stunning 3-D miniature model of a project. Now it’s time to envision the artistic side and that starts with steel.
Their still-in-progress project includes a number of concrete features inside the home, the centerpiece being a cast-in-place, carved, stamped GFRC staircase that resembles rock and leads into the basement-level man cave, graced by a sun-and-clouds water feature on the wall next to the staircase.
Decorative shotcrete is catching on, and as with any decorative concrete technique, there’s a learning curve. Here, we cover mix design, prep work and more.
Ellie Ellis of Elite Artistry LLC in Happy Valley, Oregon, and Eva Gallant of Y-Knot Creations LLC in Hurst, Texas, share a bond stronger than the one-ton concrete art piece they produced together in Indianapolis at the Concrete Decor Show.
Nolan King, owner of King Architectural Concrete and Construction LLC in River Falls, Wisconsin, started his own construction business at the age of 23 after graduating from college in 2001 with an engineering degree. His business focused primarily on home remodeling work.
Pete Johnson, who founded the U.K. division of the stone-effect coating system manufacturer StoneCoat, traveled to Sin City from his home in Manchester, England, last November for a project inspired by the natural stone colors found in Nevada.
Florida’s Miami Beach is a part of the country known for its high real estate prices, but the penthouse condominium sales price of $60 million for the Faena House Saxony Condo set a new high.
Custom rock features and hardscapes built from glass-fiber reinforced concrete (GFRC) are high-end features added to landscapes at luxury homes or commercial developments.
With initial experience as a concrete contractor, ironworker and plasterer, an artistic streak found ready expression using skills that were learned in the trades.
David Seils’ master craft, wall relief sculpture, is an art form that dates back to ancient times, when civilizations carved designs into stone walls, buildings and columns. But instead of chiseling away material, the Asheville, N.C.-based Seils builds up his wall sculptures in layers using mortar, a mason’s hawk and a trowel.
When Troy Lemon the concrete sculptor met up with Troy Wolfiss the home builder, a fireplace of great proportions ensued. Wolfiss, owner of Artisan Craft Homes, busily designed his new home which would be part of the Home Builders Association of Greater Grand Rapids’ Spring Parade of Homes.
Unlike God almighty who, according to the Bible, created the world, its heavens and all forms of life in six days, the best Troy Lemon and his mortal crew could do was hand-form and carve a concrete replica of the moon in four.
Owners of commercial and retail establishments are discovering the benefits of beautiful, easy-to-clean concrete walls.
Even on the thumb tip of northwest Washington state, decorative concrete is making its mark, thanks to this father-son outfit.
Artisans Thom Hunt and Mark Whitten led the effort to construct, sculpt and color the ginormous dinosaur. The life-size replica spans 30 feet from nose to tail and is 13 1/2 feet tall.
Vertical Artisans, launched in January 2008 at Verticalartisans. com, presents training videos and articles by experts. The site aims to offer a broader perspective than can be found at schools or training centers that, besides being bound by the limits of time and space, are often devoted to one manufacturer’s product line or one artisan’s techniques.
Nathan Giffin's Vertical Artisans hosted its second weeklong teraining at its West Coast Training Center, an underground "hobbit house" in Lorane, Ore.
The language barrier was the least of the obstacles a team of two professors and a student from Southern Arkansas University had to overcome during a weeklong trip to Cuba last November for an art project with the University of Artemisa. The saga began with a lack of supplies and ended with the death of Fidel Castro the night before the Americans left.
What’s old often becomes new again, and in the case of ICF (insulated concrete forms) construction, many people feel it’s not only ready for a rebirth but a healthy adolescence, as well.
