The world's foremost resource on decorative concrete
There’s something about its weight. There’s something about its economy of purpose, its honesty, and sometimes, its beauty. There’s just something about natural gray concrete. And the longer I’ve been in the decorative concrete field, with options for coloring systems ever increasing, the more I’ve come to appreciate it.
Longtime artist and acid stain master Gaye Goodman, 66, wasn’t always a guru of colored concrete.
She spent the early part of her career creating batiks and abstract paintings. Forms found in nature often served as her inspiration. She finally landed in the decorative concrete industry and truly blossomed.
At the Robusta Espresso Bar in Manhattan’s financial district, the dynamism of the high-voltage, high-visibility counter design concept is no caffeine-induced illusion.
In most cases, concrete made from standard gray portland cement will do the job nicely. But sometimes, especially when a pastel color takes precedence in the overall picture, decorative concrete contractors need to think outside the gray.
The unabashedly modernist home in the River’s End community, in Eagle, Idaho, near Boise, is called a “stunning glass jewel box” in an Idaho builders association’s 2013 Parade of Homes description.
The moment you step through the doors of the Children’s Discovery Museum in central Las Vegas, you know you are in for a treat. The museum promises in its mission a “vibrant and engaging experience” for children from all walks of life.
When Tom Ralston Concrete took on the job of building Todd Turowski a lap pool in the backyard of his hillside house in Scotts Valley, Calif., they did so with eyes wide open.
“The imagery was kind of inspired by the playfulness of the site,” Lucking says. “It’s like psychedelic cactuses, which is what Fourth Avenue is like.” They decided Lucking would execute the design in a mosaic on the pavement, and Goldlust would render it as cutouts in the station’s steel benches and partitions.
In the decorative concrete world, that can’t happen as easily. You get one shot at doing everything right. The interior and exterior must match, have the right scale and the right detail. While the daily work gets done, a part of you dreams to find that one client who changes your portfolio forever.
In March of 2012 my company received a call from an outfit that was working on a project at San Joaquin Delta College in Stockton, California. They wanted to discuss the issues that they were having with the application of an acid stain on almost 50,000 square feet of floor.
