Design Vogue

Concrete floors offer a durable, cost-effective, and low-maintenance option for various spaces in your home. Properly installed, they can last for decades and are versatile enough for more than just garages and patios. With options like staining, painting, polishing, or stamping, concrete floors can easily adapt to fit the aesthetic finished basements, kitchens, and common areas.

9 Best Concrete Floor Finishes That Look High-End

Concrete Floor Cost

The cost of concrete flooring ranges from $2 per square foot for a basic to $30 or more for high-end artistically rendered floors.

• Basic design: $2 to $6 per square foot. A basic concrete floor design includes pouring the slab or overlay, then a basic polishing and single colorizing treatment (staining or dyeing).
• Mid-range design: $7 to $14 per square foot. This price range includes pouring the slab or overlay, then polishing and staining with multiple colors.
• High-end design: $15 to $30 per square foot. The most sophisticated (and expensive) concrete floors can include creating geometric patterns in the slab or overlay, as well as multiple colors and a variety of texturizing or stamping techniques.
  

Maintenance and Repair

Concrete flooring is strong and durable. High heels, furniture legs, and pet claws won't scratch the concrete, though it will scratch the wax coating.

Concrete flooring should be sealed or waxed every one to three years, depending on the level of traffic. Periodically, use a neutral cleaning agent to mop the floor.

Concrete floors will settle and crack over time. This is a more frequent problem when an existing structural slab has been refurbished into a finished residential flooring surface. If the floor becomes badly cracked, it can be sealed, patched, polished, and sealed to restore its sheen.

Comfort and Convenience

Concrete flooring has little insulating value and will feel quite cold on winter mornings unless installed along with a radiant floor heating system. Carpets and throw rugs can somewhat offset the inherent coldness of concrete.

When concrete is highly polished or coated with a glossy sealer, the surface can be slippery, especially when wet. Concrete flooring in bathrooms, kitchens, or entryways becomes slippery with water, so mats should be used.

Concrete Floor Treatments

While a simple polished slab is often the right look, there are many other options for concrete flooring treatments in terms of color and texture.

Color

• Acid-stain: When treated with mild acids, concrete will interact to form a colorful mottled surface that has a marble-like appearance. Each floor is entirely unique.
• Dyed: Dye is a colorizing agent that creates a solid color effect similar to paint but more opaque.
• Paint:
• Stenciled or airbrushed: Concrete floors can serve as large canvases for a variety of artistic painting techniques.

Texture

• Polish: Concrete can be honed with progressively finer abrasive pads to create a glass-smooth finish.
• Stamping: While still wet, the concrete surface can be brushed, stamped, or embedded with glass beads or fine aggregate to give it a three-dimensional texture.
• Geometric divisions: High-end concrete floors are sometimes laid out with geometric patterns, with each segment colored or texturized in a different way for artistic effect.

Refurbishing Concrete Flooring

Existing concrete flooring can often be refurbished by removing it and grinding it to a smooth finish.

1. Remove existing flooring: Remove the carpeting, vinyl, wood, or laminate flooring already in place.
2. Fix cracks: Repair cracks in the concrete flooring with sealant.
3. Polish the concrete: Grind the concrete with abrasive pads with progressively finer grits.
4. Treatment: Stain, dye, stain, or paint the concrete.
5. Seal the concrete: Apply a concrete sealer to protect the surface.

Pros and Cons