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Archive for September, 2010

Popular tropical murals create the illusion of paradise in your home. You can bring sunshine and warmth to a room without windows or to prevent the winter blues. You can incorporate a tropical scene into your room by painting windows framing a white sanded tropical beach. You can paint a giant palm tree growing from you floor, with colorful parrots in the trees. You can have a marine theme park and water painted with sand beaches near your ceiling, and water filled with beautifully bright tropical fishes below.

Tropical murals can be difficult, layout and color, because so lifelike see the scene, you should use the perspective and coloring complex to capture light and shadow. To start simple, you can incorporate small tropical elements in the room, like a small fish behind the sofa, palm flies into the distance on a wall with colorful butterfly near shot. You can print a tropical, they hang over the sofa, and then paint white shutters around the print so that you now have a fantastic view of the beach from your living room.

Online retailers sell various tropical mural stencil kits. They send you to transfer a stencil to trace the wall and then paint by numbers. These kits cost between $ 40 and $ 150.

Done the most professional mural painter tropical murals. commissioning artists to paint murals of tropical saving you time, but no money. Depending on the size and complexity of the mural, you can expect to pay between $ 30 and $ 100 per square meter of wall painting.

Acid staining can make ordinary concrete floor look like expensive natural stone floor. Not only that fraction of the price, but also for people allergic to carpeting materials it was a blessing from God. Other applications in large houses with heated floors shine. Radiant heating is most efficient when insulating floor coverings such as carpet tiles or minimized.

Concrete floor staining, though not overly complex, can be difficult to achieve the desired results. Most people are probably better, a professional contractor. This is a risky project to-do-it-yourself.

If you’re not familiar with it, concrete stain isn’t a paint or finish coat. It involves a chemical reaction on cement materials. Typically a water-based solution of hydrochloric acid and inorganic salts, the stain reacts with minerals and lime in the concrete aggregate, and the result of the reaction is coloring. It works on new or old concrete, and is fairly durable if you maintain it with sealer or wax, since it won’t stain or chip.  It can also be applied to both interiors and exterior floors. Walkways, bathrooms, entrances, driveways, living rooms and patios are all fair game.

When it’s finished, stained concrete looks a little like marble, but more dappled and less uniform. The concrete will mostly be earthy brown tones, with hints of red and green. It’s possible to make your own tint stain by mixing colors, or applying at dissimilar rates. When you stain a concrete floor, though, don’t expect the stain to be uniform or have an even tone. Plan your room décor and color scheme accordingly, because you’ll get dissimilar reactions from different areas of the concrete, and even a seasoned pro will be hard pressed to predict what the final result will be.

Surface prep for acid staining concrete depends on what condition your slab is in. Newly poured concrete only needs is be allowed time for curing- three weeks after pouring- then some rinsing and scrubbing. Older concrete is a different story. Thorough cleaning is required because any dirt, grease, paint, sealer or even curing agent will keep the stain from penetrating and reacting as it should. Do a little test area to make sure it’s ready.

Newer poured concrete will require less stain than older floors, but in general, a gallon of water added to one gallon of stain will cover around 400 square feet. Apply the stain with a non-metallic brush or broom, working in the cooler morning or evening hours, rather than in the heat of the day. Be careful to protect yourself from spillage, drips and fumes from the acid stain, and follow the manufacturer’s precautions.

After application, you need to cleanup by sweeping away any leftover stain and residue with a broom. When the floor is thoroughly dry, it is a good idea to apply a sealer agent and then wax it.

If you are in the market for natural stone flooring, a new look for your basement or patio, or just looking for new remodeling ideas, stained concrete is something you should look into.