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My kid asked me why concrete is gray and I had no good answer
So my 8 year old was watching me patch the driveway last weekend and just hit me with it. 'Dad, why is concrete always gray?' I froze. I started mumbling about cement and aggregates, but she just looked at me and said, 'But we can make paint any color. Why not concrete?' It hit different coming from a kid, you know? I've been doing this for 12 years and just accepted it as a fact. Now I'm down a rabbit hole looking at colored hardeners and integral pigments. Has anyone here done a legit colored slab for a residential job, like a patio or something? What's the real cost and hassle factor compared to regular gray?
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brooke_taylor1mo ago
Your kid's onto something. Gray is just the lazy default.
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the_jessica1mo ago
Honestly, your kid's question is a good one. It reminds me of a client who wanted a bright red concrete floor in their garage workshop. We used an integral color, mixed right into the truck. It looked amazing wet, but it dried way more muted, like a dusty brick. The real kicker was when they dropped a tool and chipped it. That gray base layer underneath stared back like a little concrete truth. You can color it, but it's never just one color all the way through.
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