I wanted to post this picture so you can get a better view of stamped concrete. This is a large slate pattern. As you can see the texture is pretty realistic. I remember that we decided to use a light color release so as to not have very dark grout lines and gradients. Being that this is a real picture it shows you how the grout lines and indentations pick up darkness just from the environmental conditions. Hopefully this may help you make your decisions a little easier when you choose the colors for your stamped project.

Stamped Concrete Patio

Basically it’s gray on gray. It’s a very popular color combination. It looks natural and the highlights of the dark gray release become part of the ashlar slate.  This all started with a blank slate. The owners steps came down to the Earth like so many do. They wanted a change.  This is what we came up with. I really like the way they have decorated the patio. The different colored chairs and tables contrast well with the color of the patio. That is a nice way to dress up a wooden fence too. Hanging baskets and plant stands.This stamp is our most popular and has been requested a lot. It is called Random Ashlar Slate. Thank You to my customer for sending me this picture. It really looks nice!

This is my first time making concrete furniture and probably will not be my last.  Doing projects that are creative or decorative is a part of my business profile and my personality. I am not scared to try something new. If it does not work the first time do it again and again till it works. Well this project only took one take. As you can see its simple yet clean looking. When creating a project it’s really where your imagination can take you. The next step of course is putting your imagination to work. Before I built this project I consulted an engineer and discussed the area of the bench that is carrying past the chair legs. I call them cantilevers. I was concerned as to how far I could take the concrete past the legs before the cantilever became weak. I also wanted to keep the top fairly thin because I like the look of a thin top. Being that the top is thin means of course less concrete and limited re-bar for strength. Well as it turned out the engineer said I was fine with my design. My customer likes the furniture and works well on their patio. The bench in this picture is 5 feet long and it has a little brother across from it that is three feet long.

What more would you want? A beautiful yard with landscaping, trees, and furniture? Oh yea, one more thing, a beautiful stamped concrete patio to tie it all together. This stuff just doesn’t happen by accident.

Going into every project I feel confident that my crew can perform whatever I sell to the customer. Think about it, I don’t want to sell something that I cannot do. Some contractors sell more then they can give. They will tell the customer oh yea, we can do that or oh yea, no problem.

What I do as a contractor is sit down (and sometimes stand) and communicate with the customer and find out what they want. Believe me, sometimes its hard, because the customer is not always sure. So I work through the process, step by step and describe what we do and how we do it.

The communication and listening was accomplished on this project. When a project is complete is when I get my fulfillment, knowing that we did a job just the way the owner wanted it. The smile on their faces and the sincere words “Thank You Very Much” gives me a wonderful feeling.

Happy customer, mission accomplished. On to the next one…

Nothing like the red brick stamp. It always looks good. The guys put this one in without me today and they did a very nice job. The lines look straight and the curves are smooth. I have been talking to my web designer about showing the installation of the brick joints. People always ask, “How do you get the lines in there”, and I always say jokingly that it is a trade secret.  Well I end up telling them because the people who ask are generally soon to be customers. As you can see in one of these pictures and the blog before this one (a video) we squirt it in. The shape of this curb, the slant style, allows gravity to do the job for us. We squirt it from the top and it goes downhill. I always say squirting the joints  is the simplest part of the job, but it is also the one that can mess the job up the most if done incorrectly. It is what we all experience at our jobs, sometimes you get a rhythm going and they go in line clockwork. Other times it seems to go slow and you can’t keep up. Just to let you know all brick joints don’t have to be the same color, we can tweak the colors to your choosing.

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Here we are pouring the concrete sitting wall that surrounds a 125 year old maple tree in Richmond, VA. What you see in the video happens to be the easiest part of the project. Getting too this point was the hardest. The home owner, Jonathon, helped us out immensely. He dug the holes. That was the key to this project, because you don’t pick where the holes go, the tree does. Finding those holes where we could keep the form work symmetrical around the tree was a bear. We were unable to install a typical footing for this project because of the large tree roots. When we finally got around to pouring the wall we put sand at the bottom of the forms over the tree roots. This will give that beautiful old maple some time to grow before it will affect the wall. More pictures will be coming later.

A lot of times when we pour a patio, sidewalk or driveway the owner wants a border. Borders are nice because they set off the interior portion of the concrete area. In this photo for instance we used a border at the transition area from a patio that was poured years ago to the new one you see here. I suggested the border on this project for two reasons. First the original patio to the left was poured several years ago. I do not know the color or stamp that was used on the old patio. Even if I knew the color of the old patio, I know it  will not match the color of the new concrete patio. So I suggested a border to transition the two patios together. The border  does two things for this patio. It throws in a new color and a new texture. In this instance a  brick border with a darker color. Now, when looking at the patios poured it is much more difficult to notice the difference in the color or texture , because your eyes are drawn more to the darker color and busier pattern of the brick stamp between the two areas.  Something to think about if you are planning on enlarging your patio area.