Concrete countertops have taken over farmhouses in the past few years. It’s easy to see why: Installing concrete counters is a sure way to infuse your home with a rustic yet industrial feel.
Concrete is also especially popular in modern / minimalist / brutalist style kitchens and houses, where the form of the design and the look of A polished concrete bench is almost always a bit of a design statement. It’s definitely a superb choice if you’re hoping to inject an ‘industrial’ kind of feel into your kitchen, but there’s nothing to say a kitchen with polished concrete benches can’t also be completely warm, contemporary or comfortable if it’s complemented with the right overall design aesthetic. The concrete is itself prized as a feature over unnecessary decoration, or less hardy materials.
There’s a wide range of options when it comes to creating different colours for the concrete, and various dyes and colouring agents can be used to control this. Different types of aggregates can be used to give different textured looks to the concrete too.
Just like stone, concrete’s porous. What that means is that it’ll absorb moisture, and that some substances may leave a stain. We need to apply a concrete sealer – or a combination of sealers – to the benchtop to protect it from stains, heat damage and scratches.
Here are some photos of some countertops we have completed.