Staining them with coffee will do when you’re sick of your old concrete and feel like getting a refreshment. The coffee stain will make the concrete look pretty and artistic. You can make the stain by yourself and apply it however you want to.
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Stain Both Indoor and Outdoor Concrete
Be it the concrete floor in your living room or old concrete in your garden, and you can stain them all. Shading them by yourself will reduce the cost rather than hiring people to do it. Moreover, you’ll stain them with homemade coffee stain, which minimizes the expense much more. The manufacturers can vary the price depending on the product you’ll use, but generally, it’ll cost you about 10$ to 30$.
Aside from the pros, of course, staining them has its cons. Staining concrete needs time to dry, something to watch for when you want to stain indoor concrete and have kids at home. As for staining the outdoor concrete, you might watch out for rain. You don’t want the shower to wash away the un-dried stain on the concrete.
Use The Protection Gears
Whatever you’re trying to do and make, always remember safety first. You won’t only need coffee grounds for making the stain. Other materials need to be cautious, such as acid, iron sulfate, fertilizer, etc. When the materials get on your skin, even worse on the face or even eyes, it surely could lead to disaster.
So don’t forget to use the protection gears. Wear safety goggles, rubber gloves, apron, boots, and maybe an acid vapor respirator if needed. Also, remember to do the whole process carefully, really, honestly care. Read the manuals and instructions listed on the products correctly, so you know what to do and what to avoid.
Concrete Coffee Stain Formula
Here is the main thing: the formula to make a coffee stain for your concrete. You can either use iron sulfate or fertilizer Ironite to mix in the procedure. Here are the details.
Coffee, water, and iron sulfate
This formula will work the best on your indoor concrete. Indoor concrete floors are usually gray so that you can mix the coffee grounds with the rusty orange iron sulfate. This combination will create a brown stain that looks artistic on the natural gray concrete floor.
The proportion is two pounds of iron sulfate, two cups of coffee grounds, and one gallon of water. Mix this combination in a bucket, then cover it with a cheesecloth. Seal the cheesecloth with duct tape, then strain the mixture through the cheesecloth. This method will help you get an excellent stain without lumps or chunks.
Coffee, vegetable oil, and fertilizer Ironite
This formula will work the best on your outdoor concrete. Different from the previous procedure, you don’t mix the materials at once. You’ll use the fertilizer Ironite first on the concrete, then mix the coffee grounds with vegetable oil to apply on top of it.
Clean The Concrete Before Staining
Before applying the stain to your concrete, you’ll need to clean it first. Indoor concrete is way easier to clean rather than outdoor one. The concrete floor didn’t get rained on or exposed to the sun, so the dirt is relatively easy to remove. You can only use a mop and soap to clean the concrete.
Cleaning outdoor concrete is pretty tricky, especially if the concrete has an unwanted stain that is hard to remove. But don’t worry, it’s not an impossible thing to do. If the dirt and paint are not got stuck on, you can spray water onto them. But if they’re more persistent than you think, you can use acid to clean them.
Apply The Coffee Stain on The Concrete
After double-checking, you can apply the homemade coffee stain you prepared if the concrete is clean. For indoor concrete, you can apply it by using a rag or unused fabric. This will give you neat paint rather than using a mop. Dry the color for one or two days.
As for outdoor concrete, you can sprinkle the fertilizer first and spread it evenly on the concrete. Spray the water on it and leave it for two days. After that, rinse the fertilizer with water. Then you can apply the mixture of coffee and vegetable oil stain using a stiff brush. A stiff brush will help you scrub the pigment into the concrete wall.
