For many people, decorative concrete can be quite appealing. Concrete is an important material in modern world and it is versatile enough, even for decorative purposes. Concrete can help to enhance the appeal and appearance of our home. As an example, businesses can engrave their logos on the concrete; inside the lobby, on the large concrete wall outside the building or on the doorstep. Communities also use concrete decoration techniques for municipal improvement beautification. For homeowners, they can choose the same method at much smaller scale to make their house looks more attractive. There are different faces of decorative concrete. It’s actually quite straightforward; allowing us to do engraving, overlays and stamping.
- Stamping: Concrete stamping requires new layers of concrete and specially-shaped stamps are pressed, so they can become wet concrete. As a result, we can obtain tiles, stones, bricks and various other designs. Concrete can be colored before poured. In order to protect the surface, we can seal the stamped and cured concrete. In this case, we will be able to keep our design looks more beautiful.
- Overlays: Overlays are a method of adding another material layer of current concrete. We can engrave or stamp the overlay with decorative designs if they are thick enough. In this situation, we can add classic glows on concrete using diamond grinders to create polished effects. We can attend various workshops to learn more about overlay techniques. This technique may vary in quality and cost. It is important to get proper hands-one lesson related to overlays and we can finish the task in just weeks or days.
- Engraving: Engraving is a decorative method that is performed on existing layer of concrete. It is not necessary to perform addition construction task. Concrete engraving requires specific kinds of tools, but the method should work hand in hand with protective sealers and colourful stains. Engraving can be very affordable because we can apply on it on existing concrete and another big benefit is the low maintenance factor. What we need to do is to perform daily cleaning and the engraved concrete will look for beautiful for many years. It could become a low-cost addition for existing houses for landscaping and other purposes. Creative DYI-ers often enjoy performing engraving tasks and they can practice their techniques on unused slab of concrete or other hard surfaces. People with artistic skill may use freehand method and abstract patterns. They may also use straight lines to create some geometric patterns.
When choosing concrete decoration tools, we should make sure to keep the amount of dust low. It means that the decoration methods can be performed on damp concrete surfaces. We know that concrete may eventually have cracks and chips. This could ruin the decorative purposes of the concrete and in some cases, cracks don’t always provide the desired characters. For this purpose, we can use flexible crack filler for wider and deeper cracks. However, repairing cracks can be more difficult on colored, decorative cracks.