Concrete polishing

Polishing vs. epoxy coatings

Epoxy and urethane coatings sit on the slab. They look excellent on day one, then chip at the edges, peel where moisture pushes up through the slab, and eventually have to be ground off and redone.

A mechanically polished slab has nothing on top to fail. When the traffic lanes eventually dull, it gets burnished rather than replaced.

How much aggregate shows

This is where concrete and terrazzo differ. On a slab, the depth of the initial grind decides how much sand and stone shows, and that decision is worth making before we start because it cannot be undone.

On terrazzo we are refining aggregate that was exposed when the floor was installed. On concrete we are choosing it.

• Cream: minimal exposure, the most uniform look
• Salt and pepper: light cut, fine sand exposure, the most common choice
• Full aggregate: deeper cut, stone visible throughout

On most all residential concrete in Florida we recommend a top polish (cream or salt and pepper). Concrete is made with local materials, and in Florida that means limerock. Limerock is soft and does not polish well, so the less we expose the better the end result. The exceptions are floors specced from the start to be high grade polished concrete.

Can my concrete be polished?

Florida concrete varies in quality quite a bit. The best way to find out is to have us come out and take a look.