Decorative Concreting Brisbane Southside
Choosing your decorative concrete finish
Choosing a decorative concrete finish
Trowel or Plain Finish
This is a popular choice for budget conscious projects.
And yes, it’s simply a grey, smooth concrete finish. Used for slabs, standard pathways and driveways, it is highly durable and is low maintenance.
If you are seeking a straight forward solution, and something reasonably cost effective, this would be a good choice.
As with all of our projects, the same care and attention is applied to ensure the best outcome.
Coloured Concrete
This finish will enhance the look of your driveway.
Also great for any external surface and is a cost-effective way of creating a customised design. The full depth coloured concrete is quickly installed with a wide variety of colours available. This type of installation means that fading and re colouring doesn’t occur, reducing maintenance costs of your driveway.
We recommend adding a ultraviolet stable sealer to the surface to prevent marking and for easy cleaning. These sealers come in a range of finishes from gloss through to matt.
Exposed Aggregate Driveway
We can provide a durable and hard-wearing surface with a stunning finish.
It’s concrete base with an exposed top layer of a customised mix of decorative elements such as pebbles, granite or gravel giving a natural look.
Standard or a customised mix of elements will create a unique look and provides a tough and skid resistant surface. A range of options are available to meet your visual requirements and budget.
Stencilled Concrete
A stencilled finish can be used to create different decorative effects
It’s a very popular choice for driveways, patios, pathways and pool surrounds. A disposable stencil is applied to the surface of the wet concrete and colour is then added to the exposed areas of concrete.The stencil in effect masks off the underlying surface and creates an appearance of individual stones, bricks or tiles mortared together to create the desired design.Hardener is then applied to the exposed concrete before stencil removal. A range of options are available to suit your desired effect and budget.
Honed Finish
We grind the surface of the concrete
This is done to expose as much aggregate as is desired. This leaves a smooth, flat finish which is hard wearing and non slip. It is then sealed with a penetrating sealer, which is absorbed into the concrete and leaves a matt finish.
Honed concrete gives a stylish finish and is ideal particularly for pool surrounds and patios.
Polished Finish Option #1
Firstly, there is a mechanically polished concrete
This is more commonly known as MPC. Generally a more professional or commercial quality finish and is for indoors only.
When using this process it is the actual concrete itself that shines.
There is no topical coating that is applied, meaning if the surface is maintained correctly, you will achieve a long term solution .
Polished Finish Option #2
A grind and seal finish can also be produced
This results in a quality non-slip surface, suitable for use both indoors and outdoors.
It is a very popular choice for garages, driveways, shops, restaurants, bars, homes and commercial sites.
With both of the above methods of polished concrete, you can choose your preferred amount of stone exposure (meaning how much aggregate can be seen), and you can also select the gloss level – options being matte, semi-gloss or high gloss.
Other Concrete Finishes
Long accepted broom finish
This is achieved by dragging a horsehair broom, or something similar, over a freshly laid wet concrete surface.
Brushing the concrete this way creates a more textured surface with small, but noticeable grooves.
Broom Finish concrete has been available for many years, and is considered a more standard or basic texture approach for your concrete finish.
Salt Finish
What about a salt finish? This surface finish is achieved by pressing coarse rock salt crystals into the freshly laid concrete.
It is then washed off with streams of water after the concrete is set. This process results in a rough subtle texture and skid resistance to plain or coloured concrete.