Installing decorative concrete coatings remains one of our most requested services at Rush and Reef Concrete Coatings. Every month, our licensed technicians put them in garages, basements, playrooms, and roof decks, giving them a showroom-like finish that bare concrete can never match.
We entertain many questions from business owners and residents about the benefits of a coated garage floor, basement floor coatings, and metallic epoxy flooring whenever they see neighboring properties hiring contractors to install them. So, in this explainer, we will outline five reasons why people with stone, brick, and fiber cement floors choose decorative topcoats as their number one choice.
What Is Decorative Concrete and Why Is It So Popular?
Bare concrete floors are naturally porous, which means they have innumerable tiny holes that can act as a catch basin for humidity, oil droplets, water, and other forms of moisture. Accumulated liquids can create structural challenges over time, enabling mold and mildew to form and impurities to seep into the aggregate underneath your stoops, decks, and sidewalks.
In the early 1940s, Swiss scientists began studying and commercializing resinous epoxy coatings to protect outdoor concrete fixtures from cracking, flaking, and spalling from moisture. Until the late ‘80s, epoxy was the most popular floor protectant in the market, and you would be hard-pressed to find a drive-through or loading bay without a commercial epoxy floor. Polyurea and polyaspartic coatings took the construction industry by storm in the early ‘90s as they offer higher durability and impact resistance than epoxy, albeit for a more sizeable initial investment.
Epoxy, polyurea, and polyaspartic coatings in the 2010s moved from their purely utilitarian market into the interior design space. Technicians can now stamp, stain, chip, overlay, and create billions of color combinations to create interior and exterior looks that were never before possible for a cost-efficient price.
The Benefits of Decorative Concrete
Limitless Design Potential
Whether you prefer a single-color minimalist finish or the imprint of the Milky Way galaxy in the pool room of your basement, you can’t go wrong with decorative concrete. Concrete finishes offer more color combinations, textures, and lines than any other type of flooring. Decorative commercial coatings help office parks and restaurants design lobbies and entryways with aesthetics that more effectively reflect their brand message.
Our technicians can:
- Install vinyl flakes in smooth, stenciled, patterned, grooved, and engraved design schemes
- Stamp concrete to copy the visual appeal of cobblestone, slate, stone, bricks, and other materials
- Color concrete finishes in a broad range of marbling, tints, and stains
Durable Weatherproofing and Indoor Protection
Decorative concrete finishes remain popular among homes and commercial structures with sizeable outdoor utility areas, like decks, pool areas, and uncovered carports. We install them by laying down an epoxy or polyurea base coat, which we seal with a polyaspartic top coat. We provide a lifetime warranty on all these protectants as they can retain their luster and shine for multiple decades without fading or yellowing.
Commercial concrete floor coatings protect drive-throughs, factory floors, and lab surfaces from the effects of heavy foot and vehicle traffic. They can also separate spaces and demarcate rooms without walls and dividers.
Decorative Concrete Is Low-Maintenance
Unlike many home decorations that require periodic cleaning and polishing, engineers design decorative concrete to reduce your maintenance activities. A concrete epoxy floor will naturally repel dust mites, mold, mildew, and corrosive liquids with little to no maintenance necessary.
If you find debris accumulating on your floors, our technicians recommend the following:
- Brushing them with a mop or broom to remove dirt and dust
- Waxing and running a floor polisher through them at least once a year
- Resealing them every five years
Decorative Concrete Is Eco-Friendly
Our decorative concrete finishes are low-VOC, which means they contain only traces of volatile and toxic materials. We still require our technicians to wear work masks and other protective equipment during installation, but when our protectants cure, they are 100% safe for your children and pets. According to the EPA, high-solid epoxy coatings emit no emissions post-application.
Residential and Commercial Coatings Are Fast-Curing
We offer 24-hour installation to residential and SMB clients. Consider the following curing times for our protectants:
- Epoxy cures in as fast as 18 hours but requires seven days to absorb 100% traffic
- Polyurea cures in less than 24 hours
- Polyaspartic coatings cure in 24 hours
Contact Us Today for High-Quality Decorative Coatings
Contact our design team today and get a decorative concrete coating that will suit your space. Call Rush and Reef Concrete Coatings at 469-389-5807, and get a free consultation.
