We left 2 floors unfinished in the house – the master bath and the utility room. I knew I wanted to paint a concrete floors specifically the utility. I’ve been mildly obsessed with the idea since I’d seen these floors on Little Green Notebook. I couldn’t wait to DIY at the new house, so I just went and painted the concrete floors in the utility room. And you can too..
So here’s the before since every dramatic makeover needs a picture like this. I’m standing on the other cabinets to give you a feel of the room.
I used Mandi‘s tutorial on how to paint concrete. I patched a crack with some quickcrete. I missed several holes…oops. Who knew a new floor would have so many holes?? I sanded the floor down with 80 grit paper to prep for the paint!
I picked up a gallon of Sherwin Williams Porch & Floor Enamel in Pure White (same color as our walls). I literally just poured it on the floor and rolled.
Now to nail the pattern down. I knew I wanted something geometric…and 3D. Nick made a parallelogram (did you prep for a math lesson?) in illustrator. You can download the template here. I cut it out on cardboard. I started at the door and worked towards the wall for the first row. Basically I used the handmade (slightly ghetto) stencil to trace, flip, and trace again for each row. I used my quilting ruler when I drew the lines though because it was cleaner than the “stencil”.
Once the first row is set, drawing the pattern is much easier especially with the quilting ruler.
I started hand painting…with a craft brush for the outline of the parallelogram. I painted about 20 like that. It. Took. Forever. I was pretty good about getting the line fairly straight, but it wasn’t perfect. Sidenote: I’m not left handed. I just needed a picture.
I switched my strategy to frog tape. Surprisingly it saved me a ton of working time even with having to tape. I did have to do 2 rounds of taping per color. You can see some of the hand painted ones versus the taped. The darker color is SW Blue Nile. It took 3 (!!!) coats. Thank God I taped, right?
It took about 20 minutes to paint the taped floor in comparison to the 20 minutes per parallelogram that it was taking me to hand paint.
Once the darker blue was finished, I taped off for the next color SW Ebbtide. I taped a row then skipped a row and taped the next row. That’s how I should have started with the dark blue, so do it if you attempt painting this pattern. Once I finished those 4 rows (2 coats for the lighter blue with at least 4 hours of dry time), I taped off the remaining rows and painted.
Pull off the tape and bam you’ve got yourself a gorgeous cubed floor. I got my craft brush out for touch ups. I’m a perfectionist when it comes to painting. There definitely a handmade feel because it isn’t perfect, but we find it charming.
There was lots of discussion about my floor amongst the subcontractors like, “woah it’s kinda 3D if you look at right,” “are you an artist,” “this is interesting”, and etc… I’m like dudes I’m sitting right here still painting the stupid thing stop walking on it!!
I put 2 coats of Concrete Sealer Wet Look from Sherwin Williams. I made sure no one walked on it for 24 hours with a house full of contractors that was not an easy thing. You can’t move furniture (in this case a washer and dryer) on it for 72 hours. Not a problem because I finished about a week before we moved in (yesterday)!
Amazing!
Thank you Jean!
i mean, first of all, this is amazing. and second of all, you have the patience of the patron saint of patience.
Haha I have zero patience as a rule, but I don’t mind doing tedious projects. It makes no sense.
Yowza! That’s gorgeous!!
Thanks Gabbi! It was a labor of love for sure!
So freaking cool. Maybe the coolest floor I have ever seen.
Oh Eric stop you flatter me…continue!
I know your crafty wife could whip something up like this no problem!
Good luck with EC2! It looks amazing- I thought it was tile whenever you shared a sneak peek somewhere. Wish I had concrete floors!
Awesome! The goal was to make it look like tile. I’m so glad it reads that way!
Wow this is so amazing. So much work, but it came out gorgeous. And hello light fixture. So pretty!!
I love the two blues you chose to go with the white! What a floor
Good luck with the stars 
Thank you! That light fixture was on clearance at JC Penny. It’s adorable. We had been monitoring that line, so once the price dropped we jumped. I think we paid like less than $20. Incredible.
This is truly impressive. And really fun for this small utility space. Maybe it will make doing laundry a little more pleasant!
I doubt it, but one can hope!! I can see it from the kitchen though so it makes me smile!
Very cool and original! Definitely inspiring and in a weird way, I bet it was a sort of a relaxing project? Love the blue shades too!
Thank you! It was relaxing when the kids weren’t crying. Lol that sounds terrible, but hey it’s honest!!
Holy crap that’s cool!! It looks amazing. Nice work.
Thank you! It’s no coffered ceiling, but I’ll take it!
So, so fabulous! Trippy! It looks like it was a ton of work, but so worth it! I am going to end another sentence with an exclamation mark now, because your floor is THAT awesome!
I usually have to edit my exclamation points!! I mean it’s in my nature to add at least 2 to the end of every sentence.
Holy cow! You’ve outdone yourself, Amber! I love the pattern and colors you chose
Yay for finally moving in! When does the house tour start? 😉
I gave a sneak peek on Instagram of the hot mess that’s happening over here right now! 😉
This just makes my heart skip a beat! So amazing and I feel like pinning it every minute to every board I have, do you mind? 😉
Haha you know I don’t girl!!
Amber, that looks incredible! What a big impact. Glad to find you through the Creating With the Stars linkup!
Thanks Gwen! That means so much coming from you!
I literally said “oh wow” out loud as soon as I saw the first picture– you nailed it!!
You are too sweet Stephanie! Thank you!
I love this! I have to try it somewhere…hmmm…garage? faux backsplash…we’ll see. you did a great job!
Ooooo a garage would be a great place. The hardest part would be keeping the dirt out while you paint. You’d have to block all entrances and bribe everyone to stay out!! Basically what I had to do!
You are officially the DIY queen in my book for this masterpiece.
Haha thanks Court! I’m feeling the pressure to keep my title!
Saw this on Pinterest and had to pop over and check it out. Kudos for all the time spent on this. What a commitment! It really does look great. Good luck with your Creating with the Stars entry!
Thank you so much Hollie! You have the BEST blog name ever!
Very cool floor.
Thank you!
This is SO SO good!!!!!! The pattern is so fun and the shades of blue you chose were dead. on. You’ve got an eye!
How long did you have to wait for the first color to dry before taping off the second color? I am always worried I’ll pull up fresh paint with tape. I want to do this somewhere!
Thanks Emily! I usually waited overnight just because I wasn’t staying at the house. I recoated around 4 hours during the day. I was worried about pulling off the paint too, but it wasn’t an issue at all. That was a huge relief after all the work it was! I would love to see you use this somewhere and put a little Emily twist on it! It would be so good!
And my husband thought I was nuts when I wanted green and white checkerboard vinyl tile floor in my laundry room/studio. I LOVE your floor!
Oh husbands! Who wants to listen to them anyway! 😉
This. Is. Amazing.
Like, wow.
I’m pinning the bejeezus out of this.
Haha thanks Kim! Pin away!
Found this through the Crafting with the Stars… looks great!
Thanks so much for stopping by Mindy!
In about 60 seconds (as soon as I’m done writing this comment) I’m sure I”ll be ripping up ALL the carpet in my basement to be painting some concrete. Your floors look incredible! I’ve come to the conclusion that you MUST be wonder woman.
I couldn’t keep that secret for long! 😉 I’ll come help you paint!
My mind is blown, completely. These are my favorite floors, ever. Just shared on FB!
Thanks friend! You’re the best!!
So worth the bloody knuckles and broken back:) Great work!
Ah yes the back. My poor back and legs and entire body in general. It was in full on revolt after this. Signs I’m getting old.
These turned out so well! Love it! It goes so well with your bathroom tile too.
Haha I know! It didn’t realize it until I already had my colors. I think the tone of these blues just scream organization and cleaning to me, so I went with it.
Soooooooooooo pretty. You do impressive work my friend!!!
Thank you! I try and sometimes it’s good and other times I just don’t blog about it! Kidding.
I came across this via TDC — your floor is amazing!!! But I wanted to comment because we own that same light fixture but haven’t hung it yet, and seeing it in your laundry room makes me so excited to get it hung up. It looks great!
It is such a great fixture! We absolutely love it especially for what we paid for it!
These are the bees knees 😉 Seriously, I just love how it turned out. I don’t think I would ever have the patience, but yours definitely paid off!
Haha thanks Brynne! I have zero patience for pretty much anything. I have to put music on and just focus then it becomes somewhat therapeutic…as long as there are no screaming kids in the background. There definitely were screaming kids at various stages of this process!
Wow, I am so impressed with your dedication! And what an outcome! So happy to have discovered your site through the EC2! I’d love to see what further DIY amazingness you’d cook up if selected for CWTS. Best of luck, Amber!
Thank you so much Lauren! You are so sweet. I don’t think I can top these floors though, but I’d sure love to try!
Wow! That really looks amazing! So much work, but what a result. Very creative and inspiring. Thanks for sharing.
http://www.creagirl.com
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Wow!! Wow, It is fantastic! Your are great with math and patience.
Thank you so much!
Holy crap! I love this so much! I can’t wait to watch you decorate and style your house….I’m in love with the choices so far.
Thank you so much! My dining room is full of decor just waiting to be placed somewhere in the chaos that has overtaken the rest of the house!
This is so incredibly amazing and meticulous! I love it but I think I would have gone crazy painting that. It is soooo good! xo Kristin
Sooo meticulous! You wouldn’t have gone crazy. There was so much build up to see it done I was running on adrenaline!
ABSOLUTELY stunning!! Love this
Thank you so much! I almost used your 4 points stencil, but I have a wall that I think deserves that pattern! Such a great design!
Really like the pattern! Very tedious but worth it.
Thanks you! Incredibly tedious! Probably more so than I realized when I dreamt it up!
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Very nice! I love the pattern! I think more people need to realize they can paint whatever they want on pretty much any surface in their house!
Thank you! We did another high impact paint job in the nursery that I can’t wait to show. The possibilities are endless!
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This is beyond gorgeous and I want to thank you for sharing! I found this through LGN. This progect really is amazing.
Md
Thank you!! Jenny’s turned out amazing.
Stunning! I came across your blog while looking on Pinterest preparing to paint some floors in the basement. Yours is one of the most creative I’ve seen. Quick question: did you use the SW porch and concrete paint for all three colors? Or just for the base color and then normal paint for the blues? Thanks so much!
The blues are mixed with the Porch & Floor Enamel paint as well! Glad you found us! Good luck with your basement floor!
Thanks for the reply, Amber! I want a very colorful floor in my art studio and hate the thought of buying a billion gallons of pricey concrete paint. I read another blogger that said she mixed a bit of acrylic paint into the concrete paint to get different colors. Thoughts on that?
They were able to mix the colors in quart size, so the paint cost wasn’t that bad (especially in comparison to what the tile would have costed). Also Sherwin Williams is always running sales on their paint so look for that! You will seal it as well which will help with the durability. I’m not a huge fan of using acrylic paint for any thing that gets more than very light use – furniture, floors, etc. You are going to put a lot of work into your studio floor, so I would make sure you use the right paint for the job. Maybe get white and a few saturated colors and mix some colors yourself.
Do you feel the wet look sealer was a good choice? I was just at Sherwin Williams and the guy there had never heard of anyone putting sealer over the porch and floor enamel.
I wasn’t going to risk not sealing it. It’s a simple step and a fairly cheap one as well just in case. It does make it look more like a tile floor than a paint job.
Now that it has been a few years, how has the paint held up?
We’ve had some scratching but that was due to a metal piece of the washer dragging when it was moved. It scratched the concrete, so no matter what flooring would have been in there, the result still would have been the same. There’s no chipping or anything!
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