Decorative concrete | Every finish, one spec

Decorative concrete: every finish, one spec

Decorative concrete is concrete finished to look like something on purpose: stamped, stained, polished, overlaid, colored, or with its stone showing. Prices start at $2.13 a square foot for a one-color acid stain. Multi-color stamped patterns sit near the top. Done right and kept sealed, a stamped, acid-stained, or polished slab lasts 20 to 30 years or more.

Most decorative jobs get split between two companies. One pours the slab, and another comes back later to make it pretty. That split is where the trouble starts. The pour crew doesn’t know what finish is coming, so the finish crew gets a slab nobody prepped for it. Chips, bad color, and cracks follow, and each company points at the other.

We’re a concrete company based in Prague, Oklahoma. Since 2004 we’ve put down more than 3 million square feet of floors across all the work we do. We do all six finishes in-house: stamping, staining, polishing, overlays, integral color, and exposed aggregate. On a new pour, our written spec, Pour-4-Polish, builds the slab for its finish. That happens before the truck shows up.

What is decorative concrete?

Decorative concrete is any concrete finished for a look beyond a plain gray broom finish. The slab itself is the floor. There’s no tile, carpet, or separate coating on top that can peel up or wear through on its own schedule. Six main methods cover the range:

• Stamped concrete: patterns pressed into fresh concrete so it looks like stone, brick, or slate. The color comes from pigment in the mix, a color hardener spread on top, or a release agent.
• Stained concrete: this comes in two kinds. Acid stain reacts with cured concrete to make earth tones that won’t wash out. Water-based dye opens up blues, reds, and greens.
• Polished concrete: diamond grinding plus a hardener (a densifier) takes the slab anywhere from a matte 400-grit look to a mirror-like 3,000-grit shine.
• Concrete overlays: a thin cement or polymer layer, 1/16 to 3/4 inch thick, that goes over old concrete so you don’t have to tear it out.
• Colored (integral color) concrete: pigment mixed into the batch before the pour. The color runs all the way through, so a chip shows the same shade.
• Exposed aggregate: the top layer of cement paste is washed off, held back with a chemical, or blasted away to show the stone underneath. It looks good and gives your feet more grip.

Wood-look concrete and what it costs

Concrete can look like wood two ways. A stamped patio on a new pour starts at $10.48 a square foot, and wood plank is one of the stamp patterns. A wood plank overlay on an old slab starts at $7.06 a square foot.

The stamp gives you real-looking wood grain with no rot or termites. On an old slab, our Patterned Concrete Overlay gives you the look of tile, stone, brick, or wood grain without the cost and mess of tearing out and replacing the floor. Its wood plank option is a hand-detailed plank layout with multi-tone stain for a hardwood look.

How much does decorative concrete cost?

The finish you pick sets the price more than anything else. This table gives you a price comparison of the finishes, plus how long each one lasts and the upkeep it needs. Stain gets two rows: acid stain and water-based dye.

These are our current prices, and they move when our calculator does. The acid stain range in this table includes setup. A single rate, like a one-color acid stain on its own, can sit a little under it. Busy stamped patterns in more than one color, and high-gloss polish with the stone showing, cost the most. Within each finish, the price follows the scope. Acid stain runs from single color to multi-color with scoring. Polish runs from our standard salt-and-pepper cut to full aggregate exposure. Stamped runs from a single pattern to multi-color.

What moves the price of decorative concrete

After the finish, four things move the price of decorative concrete. They are how much prep the slab needs, how many colors you want, how busy the pattern is, and how big the job is. Bigger jobs usually cost less per square foot. If old glue or coating has to come off first, that adds $1.80 a square foot. To get your own number, pick a finish and options in the quote tool and enter your square feet.

For a deeper look by job type, see our concrete staining cost guide or the concrete countertops cost and design guide. Or skip ahead and get your price in 2 minutes.

Why does a single specification matter for decorative concrete?

On a split job, the pour crew rarely hears what finish is coming. So people who will never touch the surface make choices that matter to the polisher or the stainer. The American Concrete Institute has a guide for decorative floors, called ACI 310R. It says to plan the prep and the mix around the finish if you want steady results. With two companies, that planning rarely happens on its own.

Our Pour-4-Polish spec closes that gap. One written spec runs the mix, the cure, and the finish from day one. The 4 stands for four steps we control at the pour:

1. Set (the ground under the slab): Set means getting the dirt ready (the subgrade), packing it tight, and laying the vapor barrier the day before the pour. Clay that swells when wet (expansive clay) is common in many inland climates. It needs its own prep so the slab won’t move.
2. Portland (the mix): We order the mix for the finish. A polished floor needs different stone in the mix than a stamped one. Acid stain needs enough lime (calcium hydroxide) in the concrete to react with.
3. Even (how flat it lays): The industry scores it with an FF number (floor flatness) from the ASTM E1155 test. Higher means flatter. A wavy slab can eat up to 20% more diamond tooling during polishing.
4. Cure (how it dries): We cure each finish its own way. Stamped concrete needs the timing just right. A slab we’ll stain needs a clean cure, with no curing compound on it.

One spec, and one company on the hook for the whole floor.

Who uses decorative concrete?

Homes. At home, decorative concrete means polished basement floors, stained kitchens, stamped patios, and exposed aggregate driveways.

Businesses. In stores, restaurants, breweries, and showrooms, the floor is part of the brand. For a commercial space, the usual picks are polished concrete or acid stain inside. Outside, it’s stamped concrete or exposed aggregate. A polished floor ends the cycle of waxing and recoating. Stain adds warmth to places where people eat and drink.

Schools, churches, and city buildings. These owners look at what a floor costs over 20 years, not just the first day. Polished and sealed concrete have no coating to strip and replace. Their upkeep is a burnish or a reseal you can plan for.

What does a decorative concrete project look like?

Most of our decorative jobs run in the same order:

1. Visit and measure. We look at the site and measure the floor. We check every existing slab, and we test it for moisture only when the check shows a warning sign or you ask us to.
2. Prep the surface. That can mean grinding, cleaning, or taking off old glue or coating.
3. Put down the finish. The stain, the polish, the overlay, or the stamp.
4. Seal it. The sealer protects the color and the surface.

Time on site depends on the method. Staining usually takes 1 to 2 days, polishing 2 to 4 days, and overlays 1 to 3 days. Stamping happens during the pour itself. Most home jobs run 3 to 7 days from start to a floor you can walk on. If you’ve already used our online pricing tool, we have your project details, so that first visit moves faster.

Which decorative concrete finish is right for your project?

Start with where the concrete is going, not a pattern you saw online. Then use this short list:

• Outside, where winters freeze and thaw: stamped concrete or exposed aggregate, sealed.
• Inside, with heavy foot traffic: polished concrete.
• Inside, where you want warmth or color: acid stain, or water-based dye for blues and greens in rooms that don’t get much sun.
• An old slab that’s sound but ugly: a stain or an overlay, instead of tearing it out.
• A new pour where chips would show: integral color, so the color runs all the way through.

Already know the finish you want? Each one has its own page: stamped concrete, stained concrete, polished concrete, and concrete overlays.

Where do we install decorative concrete?

We install decorative concrete in six states, with crews sent from the team closest to your job:

• Decorative concrete in Oklahoma: the metros around our home shop in Prague.
• Decorative concrete in Arkansas: Northwest Arkansas, Fayetteville, and the Little Rock area. Exposed aggregate driveways and stained floors inside hold up better there than smooth stamped concrete, because freeze-thaw cold snaps in spring and fall are hard on unsealed surfaces.
• Decorative concrete in Missouri: Springfield, Joplin, and the towns along I-44.
• Decorative concrete in Tennessee: Nashville, Knoxville, and Chattanooga. Polished restaurant floors and acid-stained showrooms keep us busy in town, along with stamped patios and exposed aggregate driveways across Middle and East Tennessee.
• Decorative concrete in Mississippi: North Mississippi, where humid summers make sealed outdoor finishes outlast unsealed stamped concrete.
• Decorative concrete in Texas: North Texas and East Texas showrooms, where polished concrete with the stone showing is the usual choice.

Outside those areas, we look at projects one at a time. Every quote shows the drive cost, which is our trip to your site, as its own line instead of hiding it in the per-foot price. A number you can’t see is a number you can’t check.