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The Montego is a three-story condominium building in Oceanside, Calif., that offers roof access for its residents to relax or entertain. The building is a couple of blocks from Oceanside Pier, so the rooftop overlooks the beach. Sounds idyllic, right?
As with most things in life, a decorative concrete installer faces many choices when it comes to the products and processes he or she uses on a job. Unfortunately, the choice is often made to take the path of least resistance or buy at low cost versus favoring long-term performance and the quality of the project.
Something has to give when pigments interact with pozzolans, plasticizers and other additives in your mix.
Integral colors don’t fade, but over time, integrally colored surfaces can start to look dingy. Understanding why, and what to do about it, is just the beginning of getting a handle on color maintenance.
You don’t have to stain in vain — restoration and maintenance can fight age and wear on just about any colored concrete slab.
Everyone knows you should use white cement to bring out brilliant colors in your concrete projects. What isn’t so widely known is how to prevent white specks from appearing in some of those deeper colors.
Does the use of admixtures change the intensity of integral color?
Color specialists offer advice for getting the look that you — and your customers — are counting on.
Not any pigment can be used in concrete. The chemistry of portland cement plus exposure to sunlight and weather can cause most integral concrete colors to fade.
Understanding pigments is the foundation for successful decorative concrete.
True or false? When using a black pigment to integrally color concrete, black is black and that’s that. Answer: Absolutely false. Black is widely used in the concrete industry. It can be mixed to darken other pigments, and it can be used alone to make light grays, dark grays or […]
