Location: TAWAS, MI Contractor: Captivating Concrete Supplier: Team Elmers
Creativity, imagination, artistry, and craftsmanship are a few words to describe the After Work Project that was undertaken by Captivating Concrete, which consists primarily of two beautiful and different decorative concrete surfaces, the basement floor and the pool surround.
The 1,000-square-foot basement floor was placed and finished like any typical basement floor. After the drywall was up, the floor was hand cut with a 4-inch hand grinder and dust vacuum in a design pattern that was inspired by The Grand Palace Peterhof floor in St Petersburg, Russia. It was then dyed, sealed, and waxed.
The design layout was difficult, with figuring out the overlapping of the circles and a three-dimensional layout. All of the cutting was done with a hand grinder which required a steady hand and a strong back.
The pool structure is actually built out of insulated concrete forms. But it’s the pool surround that is the showpiece. Multiple placements, four different stamp patterns with four different colors, with a fiber-reinforced mix. The travertine patterned concrete required five coats of color hardener.
Stamping multiple textures and colors is a constant battle of lining things up and protecting previous pours. Site conditions were less than ideal, and rain events created poor soil conditions which would delay the next concrete placement.
This project takes stamped concrete to a different level. Normally, you have maybe one or two different patterns with a border but this pool surround has four different colors and four different patterns. This project pushes the limits of stamped concrete and is a great example of those efforts.
