apartment therapy changing the world, one room at a time

It's so nice. I wonder how it'd look like in black... or really really dark brown.

I'd like to know more about installation: Is it something that one can DIY or is it a very expensive/tedious process only for professionals?

and, does it off-gas?

What an unusual assortment of furniture circling the table. Floors are uber-cool though.

I just put in a white epoxy floor in my studio. There are a lot of products out there, I'm sure, but we used 100% solids epoxy from Ben Moore. It has no solvents so it has no VOCs.
it was pretty easy to install. We had to grind the floor firsts. We rented the machine and it took a couple hours to do the entire 1000 square foot space. putting in the floor took about an hour and was pretty easy. We got detailed instructions from Benjamin Moore so all went well. I love it, it reflects so much light and makes the whole space brighter.

what kind of chairs are those... the two stackable ones?

^ looks like the easy chair

We have grey epoxy floor in the dining/kitchen area of apartment, installed by the previous owners. Think it was a DIY job -- warm to walk on, and easy to clean, but scratches a lot and has dark indentations where it settled and small holes where air bubbles came up. Would keep it in the kitchen, but would not use for a common area if given the choice.

abigailm: can you tell me a little about what went into prepping the floors? i have a concrete floor with a few imperfections. there are areas where columns once stood and are uneven with the rest of the floor. i would love to grind these areas down so that they are flush with the rest of the floor.

thanks so much.

Thanks for featuring my loft! SeanG=Liquid Stereo.

The floor was done using epoxy from Epoxy Coat.
http://www.epoxy-coat.com
An instructional video is available here.
http://epoxy-coat.com/epoxycoatvideo.wmv
Their epoxy is quite good, with 100% solids and 0% volatile organic compounds. The worst part is the "acid wash" that's needed to prepare the concrete surface. If you have unsealed/unfinished concrete then a regular floor cleaning will suffice.
The floor color is actually Light Gray but appears to be a soft white. I also put white flakes in it and the white on white looks quite nice.

The chairs are the Jerszy Easy Chair. They are/were for the patio but when I brought them in for the end of the season, I liked the way the color stood out.

Cheers!

BTW: I need a color for this wall. Suggestions?
http://www.flickr.com/photos/liquidstereo/2397931325/in/set-72157600195882099/

SeanG: damn sexy floor

9th/Broadway:
If you don't need to prep the whole floor, look into renting an angle grinder from Home Depot or a local tool rental co. I did my concrete floors with a rented floor grinder for the big areas, but for closets, corners, and room edges I used a little Makita 7" grinder like this
http://www.homedepot.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/ProductDisplay?jspStoreDir=hdus&catalogId=10053&productId=100092868&navFlow=3&keyword=makita 7 grinder&langId=-1&searchRedirect=makita 7 grinder&storeId=10051&endecaDataBean=com.homedepot.sa.el.wc.catalog.beans.EndecaDataBean%4037886a40&ddkey=Search

with a diamond cup wheel, looks like this http://www.amazon.com/DEWALT-DW4771-7-inch-Grinding-Wheel/dp/B0000VVZZI/ref=acc_glance_tool_ai_-2_5_img

or this
http://www.homedepot.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/ProductDisplay?storeId=10051&langId=-1&catalogId=10053&productId=100618951

A small hand grinder should be plenty for evening out your column spots.

My HD had the Makita and the Bosch hand grinder, both came with a dust shroud you hook up to a shop vac. And they make you buy a new blade/wheel with the tool rental, I think theirs were like $50. BUT... my tool fella, said folks forget they bought the wheel, and return the grinders with the wheels in them. He had a stack of barely used wheels, both grades, and just gave me one. So it couldn't hurt to ask ;)

also, I'm not sure what the epoxy prep recommends for large cracks, but for my plain, sealed concrete, I cleaned and filled in large cracks and divots with latex-modified thinset, then ground them smooth. So if you have any patches, I'd fix them before you rent the grinder. I had a few settlement cracks in my 30yr old house, and the thinset has been a great patch, for over a year now.

southof290: thanks so much for the info! i think i might have to go with the larger grinder since the columns were approximately 12x12" and i want to be sure that it's perfectly flat with the surrounding areas.

and thanks for the great tip about the blades.

great info, thanks again.

9th/broadway-we were told we did need to grind the whole floor to roughen the surface to make sure the epoxy stuck well, but our floor was not sealed (we sealed it before putting down the epoxy) so maybe that makes a difference. if you have deep imperfections than you can fill them, which is what we did. Benjamin Moore had a self leveling filler that they said we should use but it was expensive and we only had a couple of little spots to fill so we used bondo, which kind of defeated the purpose of using an epoxy with no VOCs but that's what we did anyway. The epoxy is self leveling so it will fill in small imperfections.
I don't live in New York so I can't help you with where to rent the grinder, but i can tell you that we rented the one we used from the same place we bought the epoxy, so maybe a Ben Moore retailer in New York can help you. Using the grinder was easy and if you have a relatively even floor you probably can use sanding rather than grinding pads. I can't imagine using a hand grinder.
The most important piece of advice I would give, especially if you have a less than perfect floor, is to plan on using twice as much epoxy as they say you will need. We bought an extra 3 gallons thinking we'd return it and we needed every last drop.

I worked in a New York showroom with a glossy bright white epoxy floor. It looked gorgeous under strong halogen lighting with matte black walls, but it required an enormous amount of maintenance to look immaculate for clients on a daily basis. I think it was cleaned at least twice weekly, dusted and buffed every night, in addition to spot cleaning during the day for scuff marks and such. Rainy days were a nightmare, with each water droplet brought in by a visitor leaving a dull grey mark on the sparkling surface. Of course there's less traffic in a residence than in commercial space and you have more control over daily impact, like shoes and wet people. But I would imagine that with any white or highly glossy floor you would need to be prepared for an unusual amount of upkeep.

I'd be curious to hear sean's and abigail's experiences....

Cleaning/maintenance is not an issue for me. I sweep/vacuum once a week. It started out as sweeping but because its white (really light gray), if the last bit of dirt is lot swept up, it looks strange. Strange in that you can see where the broom and dust-pan met :)

Stains and such are a non-issue for two reasons: (1) I don't wear shoes inside my apartment and (2) the material is resistant to almost everything. I don't know if all epoxies are like that but the vendor of the product I bought makes great claims about it and the guaranty is comprehensive. The product was a bit more expensive than other epoxies though.

For cleaning I use the vacuum (DC18 Slim) and the Method O mop. Hot food spills, red wine, and the occasional nosebleed haven't been a problem.

I've very interested in the epoxy flooring. How do you specify it and what company did you use.

did you find it an economical way to finish the floor.

Any comments are appricated.

-Design/Build Firm in San Francisco-

Muratore:
It varies quite a lot I think. The cost of my materials was roughly $900 for 900 sq. ft. That being said I was advised to use twice as much as normal for the light gray color. I.e. with a darker color it would have cost $450. A friend had a 700 sq. ft. space done for $1,600.

I thought it was economical compared to acid etch/stain and the other alternatives. Its a good insulator too. Meaning its less cold than the bare concrete.

The cat might be always hanging in the room with the TV because there is a rug. Do your cat a favor and provide more rugs, animals do not do well with these kinds of floor surfaces people!

I represent a flooring product that looks like epoxy flooring but is "Greenguard Certified" meaning low VOC. It is easier to maintain and will hold up better..still when you have animals in the house they need rugs and places they can roll on.

Checkout www.lonseal.com see the Lonfloor Metro and Lonfloor stage both have the epoxy look without the toxins.

sigh, both abigailm and SeanG clearly stated that they used ZERO VOC epoxy, Benjamin Moore and Epoxy-coat.

Lonseal is only low VOC...

What I'd really like to hear, from a 3rd party, non-vendor, is what is or isn't toxic in epoxy, and compare it to sheet products like Marmoleum.

and LoriSF, if you're gonna poke around Flickr, and make blanket judgments about the way other folks live, do yourself a favor and look at all their pics, 7 months ago he talked about getting another rug. These are year-old pics that showcase his newly finished floor. It's a work in progress, like all of our homes.

My experience with "these kinds of floor surfaces" is that my cats rarely spend time on my rugs, they alternate between the cool bare concrete, the sofa, the bed, the windowsills... whatever suits their temperature or interest.

Lori: Strangely enough it took the cat a while to become comfortable with the floor. By a while I mean about 3 days. Personally I think it was the shine/reflection that freaked her out. Now she spends most of her time on the day-bed or in the wardrobe. She doesn't really hang on the rug unless I'm in there with her.

Again, I couldn't recommend Epoxy-Coat strongly enough. No odors and 100% solids. It went on fairly easy and "thickened" up nicely. The "imperfections" in the concrete were nicely taken care of too.

SeanG and others that have commented I having an older dog I needed to put rugs down everywhere near the places he jumps off: sofa, bed, etc.. otherwise he goes sliding and can hurt himself. I dislike carpet and have always had hard surface floors. I make this statement to make people aware that if they have pets the jumping off furniture onto hard or slippery floors can be harmful. Also, dogs and cats like to do their yoga on a soft surface, stretch and roll around. I am just pointing this out for those like me that like hard surface flooring that have pets.

SeanG: I'm very impressed by the floor. I tried to do a sealed coloured concrete floor over a total of 2700 sf on 3 levels of my house. Unfortunately; it tirned out very poorly (the main complaint is that it was not properly sealed and each subsequent building trade did not respect my "DO NOT SCREW UP THE FLOOR" requests; including writing the locations of electrical boxes & wiring all over it with sharpie marker).

So; I'm looking for a top coating. I'm wondering if you could take a photo of your floor; relatively close up, looking straight down at it, so I can get an idea of the distribution of the white flakes you used. Did you do it entirely yourself or did you have some help during the application? Thanks for any info you can provide.

Jason
Custom Home Designer / Builder - Edmonton, AB, Canada

AbigailM: You said:

"...we were told we did need to grind the whole floor to roughen the surface to make sure the epoxy stuck well, but our floor was not sealed (we sealed it before putting down the epoxy)"

Can you tell me what you used to seal the floor? Thanks,

Jason
Custom Home Designer / Builder - Edmonton, AB, Canada

Wow, this looks awesome. I love it !!

I do work for an epoxy company, but I really am in love with the stuff. In my experience it is very, very easy to maintain. Dirt doesn't get caught in cracks like it does if you lay tile, and if you have edges installed you don't get dirt stuck where the wall hits the ground.

You really should prep concrete floors if you're planning on installing epoxy. Sanding the concrete helps it become pourous so the epoxy can adhere to it. It also helps protect the concrete for longer. If anyone is trying to do this themself, I would definitely NOT recommend the stuff from Home Depot. It will end up costing you more than doing it right. Feel free to email me with any questions, I'd love to help!

Katie stoneluxx@gmail.com