00:00:00:02 - 00:00:19:08 Speaker 1 There are people that pour concrete and are structurally involved with concrete, and make sure that the concrete is placed right and holds the building up. I'm not that I'm about making it look good. That's my only role. 00:00:19:10 - 00:00:30:00 Speaker 1 And something about micro topping that's wonderful is that it's completely flexible as to color. We're going to tint it with pigments in the mixed water so we can we can hit any color. 00:00:30:02 - 00:00:31:17 Speaker 2 So it's not just concrete grit. 00:00:31:17 - 00:00:56:19 Speaker 1 And you know not all concrete floors are all unique because foundations are all unique. Every concrete floor in the world is slightly different. Now, of course, it involves a great deal of the engineering thought process and about materials and how they interact with other materials and so forth that I learned deeply this very tricky, very stubborn, resistant material. 00:00:57:00 - 00:01:08:15 Speaker 1 And how to talk to it, work with it, and to anticipate the 100 million things that are going to go wrong. 00:01:08:17 - 00:01:30:06 Speaker 2 Hey friends, and welcome back to another episode of the Your Project Shepherd podcast. I am your host, Curtis Lawson, and today we are going to talk about, something a very hard topic to do. We're here to talk about, concrete finishes, particularly a concrete micro topping finish, which is something I've just recently discovered here in the last few months. 00:01:30:08 - 00:01:42:09 Speaker 2 A designer that we are working with on a project suggested this finish for this particular house and introduced us to our guest today, who is David Miller with Duncan Miller finishes. David. 00:01:42:11 - 00:01:43:18 Speaker 1 Thank you. Yeah. 00:01:43:20 - 00:02:04:19 Speaker 2 So, David, again, I had never even heard of doing these types of finishes on houses until, Greg Sweat Berg and Amy Leandro introduced us on, on the project that we're on now. And, and since then, I've gotten involved in another project that we're about to start. So I'm, I'm really into the product and excited about it, but I'm still learning too. 00:02:04:19 - 00:02:11:19 Speaker 2 So I'm so happy that you're here today to talk to us about it and kind of help educate builders and homeowners alike about what can be done. 00:02:11:21 - 00:02:13:01 Speaker 1 Great great great. 00:02:13:01 - 00:02:18:20 Speaker 2 Great. Tell us about about yourself and about kind of how you got into this business and what Duncan Miller does. 00:02:18:22 - 00:02:43:21 Speaker 1 Okie doke. David Miller and I am, now a good, long, 25 year professional in this area. I consider myself a concrete finish specialist. I'm in a totally in a niche. And to be very specific, there are people that pour concrete and are structurally involved with concrete and make sure that the concrete is placed right and holds the building up. 00:02:43:23 - 00:03:09:01 Speaker 1 I'm not that I'm about making it look good. That's my only role now. Of course, it involves a great deal of the engineering thought process and about materials and how they interact with other materials and so forth. I came into this type of work in a very unusual path, I think probably a very unusual path for anyone in the construction industry, which is I come from an art background. 00:03:09:01 - 00:03:37:17 Speaker 1 I have a very sophisticated art school background, education and taught that for a while I did set designs. I did, all sorts of decorative art projects, and I was working on something like that. In the 90s, someone asked me, do you do any do you have any idea about concrete staining and finishing? I said, no, but I knew someone who did and that someone was Suzanne Duncan, and I met with Suzanne and she said, you know, I need an assistance. 00:03:37:17 - 00:04:02:22 Speaker 1 And my person's just left me. Recently, Suzanne had gotten interested in a personal way. Suzanne was an unusual person altogether. She was, involved as a woman in business, in crafts for many years, and she always forwarded these projects to their best possible outcome. And she'd gotten interested in staining concrete, which is what we did in the 1990s when it first came in. 00:04:03:00 - 00:04:33:21 Speaker 1 And her work started out. She had another income. So, she could do 12 projects a year. And I went to work for her and these were often the best pieces of architecture that were going up in Houston. We did projects at rice, we did projects at the Holocaust Museum. We did all of these beautiful custom design homes by the best architects, because they got excited to know that there was someone that could make what they wanted to see happen. 00:04:33:23 - 00:05:18:22 Speaker 1 And Suzanne was like sort of a Katharine Hepburn figure with a cigaret and wearing fashion. And I was the one with the muddy jeans on the floor right. She was also a stargazer and a birdwatcher and a grandmother, and she wanted to retire. Yeah. So all things worked out in a very particular way, so that I learned deeply this very tricky, very stubborn, resistant material and how to talk to it, work with it, and to anticipate the 100 million things that are going to go wrong and to make it esthetically, for performance and in every important way, for safety, perform as best as it possibly could and to be really, really beautiful. 00:05:18:22 - 00:05:46:10 Speaker 1 And we got renowned for that. I came into ownership of the company in January 2005. So we're about to have a 20th anniversary. Things have evolved a great deal because we didn't polished concrete in in 2005 and 2008. It just came in about that time, close to the end of the of the first decade of this century. And we now polish all interior concrete. 00:05:46:12 - 00:06:06:11 Speaker 1 And what we did before that is we worked with basically what was left to us on the day of the slab pour. That was our baby, and we had to make that one just right. So it's a really precarious operation because the builder was poor builders. They had to, like, carry this thing through and be its custodian all the way through to the the final day of Move-In. 00:06:06:13 - 00:06:33:15 Speaker 1 Yeah. And you can spray paint on the floor, for instance. It would ruin it. Yeah. Or or spill anything on it during construction. And, you know, construction is so we've learned to have a very dynamic and very engaged relationship with the builder. But our business has streamed steadily and still does today, from architects and designers who know our work and know how to support us in projects so that we can get the best results for them. 00:06:33:15 - 00:06:46:00 Speaker 1 That's our that's our goal, is to be to be able to achieve the most successful and beautiful results for our our owners, our end users, and for the architects and designers that plaisance in the projects. 00:06:46:01 - 00:07:07:10 Speaker 2 Yeah, that's a great story. I'm super excited to to be working with you on some projects coming up here. So the, the, the one that we initially got connected on, we're going to be starting next month. In fact, I need to talk to you about that and kind of get you, into a meeting with my project manager to kind of go over the workflow. 00:07:07:12 - 00:07:32:06 Speaker 2 But, you know, I was introduced to you through an architect and a designer on that project, and it's a I think it's going to be an architecturally significant house. It's going to be super, super cool. House is one of these clients that I think every builder dreams about having. It's it's, it's a guy who just kind of wants what he wants, and he trusts his architect and designer and builder. 00:07:32:06 - 00:07:52:17 Speaker 2 He he trusts his team, and he just says, hey, you guys, help me design this. I'm going to give you a thumbs up, a thumbs up, thumbs down. But I'm going to give you some leeway to to design this thing to make it look good. And so, you know, he's not going to be, super, you know, picking the right word, but he's not going to he's he's not going to be driving. 00:07:52:17 - 00:08:10:20 Speaker 2 He trusts his team to drive the project. And so I'm really excited excited about how that's going to turn out. And we're going to have a blend of some of your work in there. We're going to have some, some, polished concrete finishes on the floor exposed to aggregate. We're going to have microscopic finishes in the shower. So I think it might be worth, if the end of that. 00:08:10:20 - 00:08:15:04 Speaker 2 You know, I was doing a video there on site where we walk through and and talk about. 00:08:15:09 - 00:08:15:17 Speaker 1 That'd be. 00:08:15:17 - 00:08:20:14 Speaker 2 Great. The finished product, too, I think. I think the people watching this would love to see kind of a finished product. Yeah. 00:08:20:16 - 00:08:21:17 Speaker 1 00:08:21:19 - 00:08:37:10 Speaker 2 So but again I love your story. You know I'm, I'm a somebody who came into this business also for more of an arts background, I went to school for music, I thought I was gonna be a musician conductor and all that kind of stuff. And so, I also kind of transitioned from that world into this world. 00:08:37:12 - 00:08:57:18 Speaker 2 So it's always great to meet a fellow, artist and creative, creative, creative person who ended up in this business. So, anyway, we're going to talk about a couple different things today. Take this in a couple different directions. We'll talk about concrete micro topping finishes, which is kind of initially what my my focus, what I want it to be. 00:08:57:20 - 00:09:19:07 Speaker 2 But then I also want to get into talking about, you know, the exposed, finished, maybe polished concrete floors, which is what people more traditionally think of, I think when they think of, concrete finishes. So, you know, we'll start off with concrete, micro toppings. So just let's just define that for people. What is a concrete micro topping finish. 00:09:19:09 - 00:09:49:20 Speaker 1 All right. So concrete make our toppings are, I would say a cousin of stucco. But and they're a cousin of Venetian plaster, but there's no plaster involved. It's a Portland cement product. And we buy, a powder which is mixed with water and pigments to produce an ultra thin micro topping. Refers to 16th to an eighth of an inch, coating, which is hand applied. 00:09:49:20 - 00:10:26:00 Speaker 1 This is a very highly crafted process. My guys are our artisans in that respect that they're traveling this on for both evenness and a certain movement. In the final appearance and by movement, I referring to something a little bit like the grain in stone or, or the movement in a tile pattern, except that it's an overall monolithic appearance for the whole wall, if that's what you're doing. 00:10:26:02 - 00:10:56:11 Speaker 1 I was introduced to micro toppings about 10 or 15 years ago, 15 years ago, and we've had them in place for a long time. The product that I particularly like to use is meant for outdoors and is extremely resilient and goes down and bonds to either poured concrete or to a backer board. It will only join to a a cement based substrate. 00:10:56:16 - 00:11:24:15 Speaker 1 Okay, anything I can't go on on sheetrock. We've tricked sheetrock sometimes by painting it with a universal primer. And so the the, our micro topping thinks it's on concrete, but we don't like to do that in high traffic settings or anything like that. So in other words, micro topping is extremely versatile. My what I like about it is that that particular material does not look like a slick plaster. 00:11:24:15 - 00:11:53:01 Speaker 1 It has a slightly granular aspect to it, and therefore it has, a mineral quality to it. But it's also extremely refined and intentional. And you see this exact appearance that was clearly meant to be. It's not, you know, it's not like, oh, that's an accident, that this happens to come out this way. And we've used it in some very, very beautifully, beautifully crafted offices. 00:11:53:03 - 00:12:09:02 Speaker 1 We've used it in many vertical applications. Homes as well as businesses, so that it goes on a fireplace surround, for instance, on a firebox outside in a in a landscape setup. Yeah. In someone's outdoor entertainment or outdoor living area. 00:12:09:07 - 00:12:15:15 Speaker 2 We did. You did in the same house that we're going to be doing the bathroom in. We just did it on the outdoor living space of that house. It turned out great. 00:12:15:18 - 00:12:49:09 Speaker 1 So we could go on on decks and walkways. And it's been very successful in that. We have an installation that we just saw this week from from 15 years ago that's just beautiful out in nature. And, it's extremely resilient. People's natural question is, oh, does it chip or anything like that? And I say, no, if the surface that it's attached to is well prepared, and if the material is well applied, there's an emphasis, even in the instruction manual, about pushing it into the pores of the whatever you're grabbing it on to the concrete that you're grabbing it to. 00:12:49:11 - 00:13:22:05 Speaker 1 And so there's a so it's all about the handcraft. This is not something for someone to just sort of try out after, say, the kind of always makes me smile. This is how we use it. I've had the tech representatives and the local sales reps from our supplier, from our manufacturer, which is the biggest manufacturer of these products in the country, come by our projects and they say, wow, I've, I've never seen anything like that. 00:13:22:07 - 00:13:24:12 Speaker 1 And I say, you have, you know, like that. 00:13:24:12 - 00:13:25:00 Speaker 2 Good or bad. 00:13:25:03 - 00:13:45:13 Speaker 1 But you see this, but you see your products in situations all the time. And they say, yeah, but we didn't know. They never looked like that because apparently everybody else stirs this stuff up in a bucket bucket and pours it on. And that's the end of that. But we apply this esthetic approach to it, where we know we can make it beautiful and look like a monolithic piece of poured concrete. 00:13:45:15 - 00:13:53:18 Speaker 2 I mean, like a lot of products, it's really more about the person applying it, this the skill level of the person installing than it is the actual product itself. 00:13:53:19 - 00:13:55:06 Speaker 1 That's right. Yeah. Yeah. 00:13:55:09 - 00:14:09:20 Speaker 2 I mean, that goes with a lot of things in a home. The they get installed, you know, there's there's a million guys out there who can paint a house. Yeah. How many of them can, can produce a really fine finish with the same material that the other guys make? Looks sloppy. 00:14:09:20 - 00:14:28:06 Speaker 1 So people will ask me, oh, so what's your product? What's your product? They want me to name the product. And I say, well, we use whatever products we need to use to create this result, but our our process and our craft are what your that's what delivers the value team. That's as exactly as you just said. 00:14:28:12 - 00:14:34:15 Speaker 2 Yeah. They're asking you that because they want to go buy it and try it out on their own, or get somebody else to try it and see if they can duplicate it. Right. 00:14:34:15 - 00:14:37:10 Speaker 1 Good luck on that. 00:14:37:12 - 00:14:55:07 Speaker 2 So, some of the main applications for that product are what I mean, you, you mentioned, you know, some vertical surfaces, some for me. What what are the most common applications that you guys installed in or that you're asked to install it in? 00:14:55:09 - 00:15:29:22 Speaker 1 Residentially, we've used it in just such a huge variety of situations. And sometimes it's a compliment, as you were just talking about this upcoming project to, to a finished concrete floor, where we will take a related color, for instance, up on the walls or into a bathroom. We've done it inside of showers. We are it's constantly just being bent to whatever the designer can imagine. 00:15:29:22 - 00:15:49:12 Speaker 1 As long as they as long as the builder can fabricate it out of backer aboard. That's our friend. If it could be done in backer board and in a shower situation, a wet area. We also like it when it's given a, scratch coat behind it. A masonry scratch coat is a perfect setup for us to use for that. 00:15:49:14 - 00:16:24:20 Speaker 2 Yeah, that's what we're doing. So on on the one on the the big project that we're doing, you know, again, we're going to do the polished concrete floors, but then we're going to take the micro topping up the walls and the showers for kind of a seamless look. And I think we talked about using a, more of a traditional shower backing set up where it's a, a mud and lath type setup, where we're putting that scratch coat on there, and then you guys are applying it over that because that's the most, I guess the stiffest, the kind of the, the strongest, hardest, backer that we can put on there. 00:16:24:20 - 00:16:29:09 Speaker 2 It's more it's stiffer than just putting, quarter, half inch, backer board on. 00:16:29:09 - 00:16:48:15 Speaker 1 Even when the backboard is reinforced. It's better to do it this way. Yeah. If you're doing a wall in a room, I'm fine with backer board. It could be a even a quarter inch backer board, as long as it's on a sandwich of of heavy ply behind it. And then we have really sturdy results. Something I should mention about the micro topping is it doesn't have any tensile strength. 00:16:48:15 - 00:17:10:12 Speaker 1 It will break on a seam. So whatever it's attached to has to be built like a rock. And I've gone into commercial situations and the builder has put up a bunch of metal studs and sort of bridged them with backer board. And I said, I'm sorry, you've got to redo this. You know, my apologies, but that's what we require a much, much sturdier support for it. 00:17:10:14 - 00:17:15:10 Speaker 2 Yeah. So so basically it's only as good as the, as the substrate behind it. Right. 00:17:15:10 - 00:17:16:03 Speaker 1 That's right. 00:17:16:05 - 00:17:37:11 Speaker 2 Right. And so that's why doing the button lath set up the whole wall as it has been floated seamless. You know, we shot the lath on the wall. Floated that with a layer of concrete. But that scratch could on there. So there are no joints between panels. It's just a seamless installation. And that what you guys kind of not worry about as much about having, cracks on joints and things like that. 00:17:37:13 - 00:18:00:08 Speaker 1 You want to give us something as close to a masonry support as possible? Yeah. And that one qualifies. Or a backer board on top of another support or a poured concrete. And our most, most typical interestingly, commercial application for this finish has been through a particular interior architect. And they love to have us do this on columns in offices. 00:18:00:10 - 00:18:28:12 Speaker 1 And so you'll have a variety of materials in that office. There might be carpet, there might be there's one that is very, very, very, very, very high design office for a publicist. And it has an epoxy floor, white slick epoxy floor. And then we did these huge structural columns that are micro topping in a in a gray. And the, the tension and the back and forth between the slickness and the slight earthiness and precision of those two things. 00:18:28:12 - 00:18:31:04 Speaker 1 It's like really rich as an esthetic result. 00:18:31:05 - 00:18:33:19 Speaker 2 And those columns were more poured concrete columns. They were. 00:18:33:19 - 00:18:35:21 Speaker 1 Poured concrete columns that we went directly on top. 00:18:35:21 - 00:18:44:00 Speaker 2 Out. Okay. Very cool. What are some of the most interesting things that you can think of that you've done this product? 00:18:44:00 - 00:19:19:06 Speaker 1 Well, well, maybe one of the most interesting was, was this, that same interior architecture firm brought us into a project that's a recent, luxury residential high rise in downtown right on Market Square called Brava. It occupies the former lot of the Houston Chronicle building that was there for decades. And if you walked by that lot that late at night, you'd see the presses rolling through the big, you know, enormous, enormous building with glass windows and the presses rolling inside. 00:19:19:08 - 00:19:51:23 Speaker 1 So now it's, really beautifully designed. Munoz and Albin is the architecture firm for the shell building. And then. And then Mars was the architect for the interior, and, we did columns for them, these very large lobby columns, two of them, in our micro topping. And then they had decided as an overall design intention to put lots of echoes of the Chronicle and the history of press and print into the building. 00:19:51:23 - 00:19:52:10 Speaker 2 Oh, cool. 00:19:52:12 - 00:20:22:01 Speaker 1 Right. So there is even wallpaper in the in the elevator landings that is like a thousand newspaper pages superimposed over each other so that it's a very completely abstract pattern. It's a very soft pattern. Yeah. What followed our work on these columns was that a highly specialized, muralist did an embossing, a raised lettering of many, many chronicle headlines. 00:20:22:03 - 00:20:56:18 Speaker 1 And so these columns are coated with little fragments of language that refer to all of Houston's history, space travel. You know, the port and all sorts of artist, millions of myriad incidents from our from our city's history, that brings this kind of another level of richness to it. That was an interesting one. But we've done things like someone had a 17th century green soapstone sink that they had brought back from France, and they and they, the builder built a pedestal for it, and we coated that in the same color. 00:20:56:18 - 00:21:22:12 Speaker 1 So it looks like a monolithic piece of furniture or fabrication built into this, to this bathroom of their house, you know, just one of the things that makes my business lively and interesting and and challenging in a great way is that we have almost always unique work. We don't really have that much repetition. We have certain systems that we bring to many, many projects over and over again. 00:21:22:12 - 00:21:28:11 Speaker 1 But it's like, okay, this is going to be a curved pathway. How are we going to actually arrive at this particular goal? 00:21:28:11 - 00:21:44:09 Speaker 2 Yeah, yeah. That's why I love the custom homebuilding and and renovations businesses because there's there's nothing cookie cutter. You know, we're not doing the same house over and over. Everything's different. It's it's it's exciting every day to be working on something unique. 00:21:44:09 - 00:21:44:19 Speaker 1 Yeah. 00:21:45:01 - 00:22:24:20 Speaker 2 Yeah. Thank goodness. There's some there's a lot of personal satisfaction that, that you derive from that. Right. So I wanted to do kind of a quick rundown of, you know, we, we kind of already touched on this a little bit, but kind of the process for the installation without giving away your trade secrets. Right. But but just just talking even about what builders need to be thinking about earlier on as they get ready for you to apply these types of finishes and then, you know, when, when do you like to come in the project and execute this, or do you want to do things you know before certain other trades? 00:22:24:20 - 00:22:39:16 Speaker 2 Do you want to be at the end? So just kind of talk about what, what what that process looks like. If somebody is going to be using this product, let's say, whether it's a shower or a fireplace or whatever, in a, in a residential setting, 00:22:39:18 - 00:23:03:00 Speaker 1 So from the builders perspective, I really advise that they have a meeting with me and, you know, go over the drawings and say, what, what what can you do for this project and what's your what what would be my what what's my requirement that I ask of them? So and we would talk about the setup, the actual fabrication and so forth. 00:23:03:02 - 00:23:23:16 Speaker 1 There will be at some point, a conversation with homeowners and designer about the color that's desired for that, that area. And something about micro topping that's wonderful is that it's completely flexible as to color. We're going to tint it with pigments in the mixed water so we can we can hit any color. 00:23:23:18 - 00:23:25:09 Speaker 2 So it's not just concrete gray. 00:23:25:10 - 00:23:50:15 Speaker 1 No, not at all. We've done we've done blues. Recently. Well, I'll say there's a color that just sort of in the last few years I've seen it in a number of, projects, really good architecture in, the Yucatan area and Tulum, especially that where they like to tint concrete pink. And it's not a warm me up concrete, warming up color. 00:23:50:15 - 00:24:14:01 Speaker 1 It's a, it's actually a cooling kind of pink, but it's also very traditional in Mexico. And we did that color to a floor here in the last month. And we will be doing the shower surround in a similar related color. I'll just say it'll it doesn't it doesn't need to be the exact match of the floor color, but it'll be something that complements it. 00:24:14:01 - 00:24:20:05 Speaker 1 It is a good, good neighbor for it. Yeah. But yeah, we can pretty much hit any color. 00:24:20:07 - 00:24:39:23 Speaker 2 So when, when do you like to come in and execute these finishes during the construction process? Because, you know, when, when builders are planning, a tile installation and a shower or a countertop installation, you know, there's kind of certain sequences we like to go in. Is there any particular time that the works better for, for you to do your work? 00:24:40:02 - 00:25:05:19 Speaker 1 Yeah. And this is very this is unlike all of our, floor finishes where polishing a concrete floor that we'll talk about that in a minute, but that's different timeline. Micro topics happen pretty much at the very close of construction. They're they're way out there at the end where wall coverings are happening, where, paint is complete, fixtures are in place. 00:25:05:21 - 00:25:19:04 Speaker 1 All of the neighboring elements are in place. Unless we have something like a column in a recess in a ceiling where we have to get their finish in there before they drop that ceiling. 00:25:19:06 - 00:25:21:11 Speaker 2 Kind of a good line of demarcation, right? 00:25:21:11 - 00:25:43:00 Speaker 1 Yeah, we have to. So as long as we have access to it, we really want to do it last. Because well basically because of the logistics of construction, it's much easier for us to take care of the other person's finish next to us than it is for them to take care of ours. And strangely enough, sometimes still people don't get it that that's a finished piece of work. 00:25:43:01 - 00:25:52:02 Speaker 1 Yeah. So even if we protect it and cover it all up. So we like to do it as late in the day as possible and along with the other real crafted finishes. Yeah. 00:25:52:04 - 00:26:32:21 Speaker 2 So so if it's a if it's a shower basically after everybody else is done their painting, other finishes are installed, but maybe, maybe it's just the plumber coming back after you to put the to put the valve, put the handles on. Right. It's all right. Yeah. Okay. Great. So, it's really important with all these finishes for you to be involved early on with design and have these conversations with, you know, the architect, the designer or the builder, just to kind of set an expectations, set that baseline before everybody starts, because, you know, the builder needs to be kind of sequencing it properly into his schedule and understanding the whole team needs to have 00:26:32:21 - 00:26:37:21 Speaker 2 an understanding of what you have to have set up for you to be successful. Right. 00:26:37:23 - 00:26:58:13 Speaker 1 And many are unfamiliar. So they so it would be I'm just going to ask your listeners and viewers that if they are considering this in the project, go ahead and give me a call and and talk over what you'd like to see and what I would need to do to provide that. And that would be great because it's a new material for a lot of folks. 00:26:58:13 - 00:27:04:01 Speaker 1 People have worked with plaster, people have worked with, with wall coverings and so forth. But this is kind of new for folks. 00:27:04:02 - 00:27:31:17 Speaker 2 Yeah. So this next this next question, I already know the answer to this just because I've been working on budgets on these projects. But, you know, without getting into an exact, you know, cost per square foot, you know, it's which I, I hate that kind of cost per square foot metric anyway. But comparatively speaking, how does the cost of doing a, like a, micro topping finish compared to doing other you know, wall cladding or flooring options? 00:27:31:17 - 00:27:37:20 Speaker 2 And are there any other benefits to consider versus if there's other products? 00:27:37:22 - 00:28:04:20 Speaker 1 I would say, it's in the exact pricing realm of, Venetian plaster or a clay finish. That's the kind of that's the kind of pricing that we're talking about. Yeah. It's going to be uniquely crafted for your project. Only we won't repeat this in another room. And it will be executed to perfection by our artisans on site. 00:28:04:22 - 00:28:19:01 Speaker 1 Yeah. And we'll provide you with all the support you need in the builder. Needs. Will provide a mock up sample on a panel before you to confirm your. You're going to come to us with a color request, and we're going to come back to you with that. So it's in that it's in that pricing room. 00:28:19:06 - 00:28:53:00 Speaker 2 Yeah. I mean, I, I would say and if you're a builder and you're already using an expensive, I would say an expensive quote unquote tile installer, and you're already doing like a really good shower enclosure, let's say, or a really good fireplace varnish. It's probably pretty comparable to what you're already spending like for, for example, on this project that we're about to do the, the bathroom on, if this remodel project, it came in maybe slightly higher than kind of what I had budgeted to do a high end tile finish in the same area. 00:28:53:02 - 00:29:15:10 Speaker 2 So, you know, it's it's, it's pricier than, you know, the cheap guy putting in some white subway tile for sure. Right. But if you're already doing a a high end tile product with a good installer, you know, I, I feel like it's kind of in that same price range. So if for people who are listening, who kind of want a frame of reference. 00:29:15:12 - 00:29:38:16 Speaker 2 No. On, on on flooring, I think it's, you know, it worked out to be a decent bit more than putting down a good wood floor, but again, it's a, it's a unique finish that, you know, you can't get that look from doing tile or wood flooring or anything else. So, if, if, if you want that look, there's, I would say there's not a substitute for that on the market. 00:29:38:16 - 00:29:52:16 Speaker 2 So it's it's, it's worth that cost. But if that's the look that you're going for and, and and lucky for me and lucky for you, we have some clients who who see it the same way. 00:29:52:18 - 00:29:53:15 Speaker 1 Yeah. 00:29:53:17 - 00:30:22:12 Speaker 2 Yeah. I mean, it's the it's the same, it's the same thought process for people using, a very high end carpenter, you know, let's say, like, you know, we we we're very lucky at my company to have a good carpentry staff on the payroll and, you know, we get asked to do some, some very interesting and high end carpentry tasks, whether it's with cabinets or a piece of furniture or whatever. 00:30:22:14 - 00:30:35:23 Speaker 2 And, yeah, they're going to pay way more for my guy to, to, to to custom make them a piece of art. Right. But they're not going to go buy that off the shelf, and they're not going to get Chuck in the truck to make that kind of product. 00:30:35:23 - 00:30:46:06 Speaker 1 So and they're not going to look back in it later with regret and say, I wish we had gone for the other one because we really are only so satisfied. Yeah, moderately satisfied with what we got. 00:30:46:10 - 00:30:48:17 Speaker 2 Yeah. I wish I had save $2,000. 00:30:48:19 - 00:30:49:20 Speaker 1 Yeah, yeah. 00:30:49:22 - 00:31:14:09 Speaker 2 You know, I mean, I think people never say I wish I'd save the money unless they got a bad product. If they got a bad product, they're like, why did I pay so much for that? But if it's a beautiful piece of work, they're going to say, man, I'm glad I spent that money because that special, so I wanted to hop over to talking about, concrete floor polish, concrete floors, finished exposed concrete. 00:31:14:09 - 00:31:30:01 Speaker 2 And again, this one of those things that I think people when they think of concrete finishes, this is probably what comes to mind first. And I know over the years I've had a lot of customers come to me and say, I want to do a concrete floor in my house, and I want to, quote unquote, save some money. 00:31:30:01 - 00:31:55:10 Speaker 2 I want to save some money and do a concrete floor. And I think that's a big misconception. And, you know, depending on what other flooring options you're looking at, it could be a cost savings. I don't know, but, you know, like anything else, to do it, right, if you know, you're not going to, you're not going to save this huge amount of money ever doing wood because to do it right, you're you're getting that fine finish and you're paying a experienced craftsman to do it. 00:31:55:12 - 00:32:24:18 Speaker 2 So that's a misconception that I'm often I'm sure you as well are often fighting is, hey, this concrete floor should be cheaper than doing Tyler Wood right? But, so anyway, I just wanted to talk about, those exposed concrete floors I was exposed. I mean, just we're looking at finishing the slab that's already there, right? So, and I really wanted to kind of focus on kind of what are the steps to achieving a really nice look. 00:32:24:18 - 00:32:53:13 Speaker 2 Right? Because I think a lot of people could not pay attention, not care as much and get to the end and kind of have it okay, looking for. Right. Like, but as you mentioned earlier, there's a lot of babysitting that that has to go on to make sure that you're getting a really good finish. I think about how many job sites I go on where the, you know, the project manager, the subs have taken their their rattle can of paint and they're marking everything on the floor. 00:32:53:13 - 00:33:11:16 Speaker 2 You know, they're drawn arrows there. They're marking their, their, electrical on the floor. They're making notes to their trades on the floor. And it's like they get happy with that can of spray paint. Right? And, that's that's something that, you can't just go willy nilly with a can of paint when you're, when you're in goal is to have a fine finish right. 00:33:11:18 - 00:33:33:18 Speaker 1 Well, and I'm going to speak just momentarily to micro topping interior floors okay. Because I mentioned that it comes it that comes in from the outdoors. We started using this and the product was intended for decks, you know. But I just revisited our one of our real flagship projects, with content architecture. It was a redo of a Frank Welch house. 00:33:33:18 - 00:34:05:16 Speaker 1 Just a such a beautiful, consummate arc building looking beautiful. It's a 2013 project. We just did a big, just kind of a refresh of it, recoded it with sealer. The whole interior has is divided into some white parquet floors and some dark micro topping floors. And I'll say that it is a little bit more delicate. It's delicate on the realm of a maybe. 00:34:05:16 - 00:34:30:16 Speaker 1 I'm not sure which wooden floors are the more ones that you have to sort of worry about more and make sure that the dogs have their nails trimmed like that, but this is that. And the and so I don't do micro topping floors in commercial settings where they're really going to get beaten up. I can't give you a more resilient floor than the foundation slab that is a rock, right? 00:34:30:18 - 00:34:54:00 Speaker 1 And it can perform for you for the next 50 years and it'll be fine. It'll take very little to maintain that. So, that's just a, a comment about micro topping is a is used on floors because we've just been talking about it pretty much on vertical surfaces. I love it as a floor finish. It's useful and it's useful and desirable in certain projects like the one that we're working on, that one it's perfect for. 00:34:54:00 - 00:35:27:12 Speaker 1 It's like we're sort of creating an entire envelope in the interior out of these related concrete finishes, and it's going to be beautiful. Right? And that one won't get, you know, a heavy, heavy, heavy use. Yeah. So it'll be fine. And residentially this finish is fine. The micro topping finishes fine. So I've been doing it now. I've done hundreds and hundreds of finished interior floors and I say exposed concrete because instead of hiding it with tile or wood, we are seeing the concrete itself as the final floor. 00:35:27:14 - 00:35:55:06 Speaker 1 And everyone in the audience is familiar with polished concrete. By now it's become a real Leed standard in especially in retail. And you've seen the H-e-b floor and the Walmart floor that have been polished. They're sort of, very, very uniform. They have been polished down to the point where there's a little bit of sand showing usually in the H-e-b, you'll see a very, very well maintained floor that has these dull splashes. 00:35:55:06 - 00:36:21:20 Speaker 1 And they fit in the salad vinegar oil, aisle. Because that's the only thing that's really an, an enemy of these floors is acids. Yeah. Even when they're in use. And it's okay for the H-e-b to have that every once in a while. So this is a tremendous, a tremendous way of doing a floor. We do the craft end of it. 00:36:21:22 - 00:36:48:00 Speaker 1 And yes, in my history, I've had people say, okay, so I've had architects propose a finished concrete floor to their customer, and the customer says, well, you know what? What are the good, good and bad aspects of that? And, the architect will say, indeed, there will be some, some cost value in it, you know, and we'll put that over here in your other finishes. 00:36:48:02 - 00:37:14:17 Speaker 1 But we can do it. And we know that there will be a superb outcome because we've got an artisan involved, and he will make sure that the esthetics are exactly at the highest level. Now, I think our costs for polished concrete floors are comparable to the fully installed and costs of maybe I'll have, a high end tile floor, probably. 00:37:14:18 - 00:37:42:16 Speaker 1 And so I'm just speaking momentarily to the cost aspect of it. I think it's exactly well, I think it delivers the full value of that of, of of what the customer will spend on it, and it will continue to serve them throughout their time in their house and be beautiful the entire time. Concrete floors are all unique because foundations are all unique. 00:37:42:16 - 00:38:07:18 Speaker 1 Every concrete floor in the world is slightly different. We tend to have a certain coloration of natural concrete. Here in Houston, if you walk on the beach in Galveston, you see this sort of warm silver gray color. That's what we tend to get in Houston for concrete foundations. How much of a crazy. Well, two things we're going to pour. 00:38:07:19 - 00:38:29:20 Speaker 1 We're going to start out on the very first day of construction and provide you with the finished floor that you'll have at the day that you move into your house. How nuts is that? Yeah, right. And the answer is not at all, but it requires an extra level of coordination for the builder, for sure. And it requires a certain level of intentionality on all the professionals involved. 00:38:29:20 - 00:38:54:04 Speaker 1 Everybody really has to be on their game. And the architect has usually taken the prospective owners to a finished project of mine for instance, and they walk them through it from one of their own designs and they walk them it they said, here's a finished concrete floor. What do you think? And they'll point to the spot on the floor and they'll say, see, there's a crack there. 00:38:54:06 - 00:39:11:23 Speaker 1 And and they'll say, and this is very wise of them. They say, you're going to have one of those, you're not going to have dozens of them, but you're going to have one because they're stress cracks and it's in a hot weather pour. In Houston you'll have 1 or 2 of those. It's a feature. And the homeowner will say, oh, we're comfortable with those. 00:39:11:23 - 00:40:00:00 Speaker 1 And so you get over some of that, initial mystery of this particular material. What are its qualities? My quality, my, my material has numerous, variations. It's constantly it's all over the surface of a slab. It's got very slight differences in appearance. And that's it's one of, I think, one of its features and one of its strengths esthetically, is that it has this naturalness to it that we can refine with great intention and craft so that we can bring it to exactly the point that it should be, when we're working with the design team and the owners, we and and I strongly emphasize this to all the architects and builders out 00:40:00:00 - 00:40:24:20 Speaker 1 there. Require a mock up in all these projects in the case of the micro top, and you do it on a panel and show it to them. In the case of the floor, it has to be done on that concrete, whether or not there's stain color involved or if it's the natural color of the concrete, it must be done in that setting, because that concrete's different from over here next door. 00:40:24:22 - 00:40:46:02 Speaker 1 And if I did the same process on two different floors, it would come out completely differently. So if they say to me, we like the image on your website of this particular floor, it's got a lot of features and patterning or we really don't want that. We really want a very, very quiet appearance. And I say, okay, fine. 00:40:46:04 - 00:41:03:21 Speaker 1 Here where the kitchen island is going to go in the future, we're going to we're going to work that sample so you can all stand together and look at it and stand back and say, oh, I can see how this is going to work for my room, for my house, for my for the whole package after it's done. 00:41:03:23 - 00:41:29:20 Speaker 1 And I can and I can go forward with their confidence that they're going to receive what they're looking for. And I think that there has to be a level of trust in the professional, meaning me, and also in the team for that process to really be sweet. And we have occasionally had, of course, in the over hundreds of projects, we've occasionally had a, you know, less of that. 00:41:29:22 - 00:41:47:17 Speaker 1 And there have been times when people have said, well, I'm not sure we got what we asked for. And usually at that point the team gets together and stands in a group and says, well, you know, my my architect or builder, says, David, what can you do about this one corner that they're not crazy about? And I give them a solution to that. 00:41:47:19 - 00:41:51:01 Speaker 1 So team is very, very important. 00:41:51:03 - 00:42:20:16 Speaker 2 How important is it that the, the, the concrete company who's pouring the slab, the guys doing the finishing work at the time of the pour? How important is it for them to get everything just right as far as you know, because I've walked plenty of slabs that aren't, you know, flat and level because the, you know, the mentality is like, oh, it doesn't have to be perfectly flat and level because, you know, the poor guys are going to come in here, they're going to pour, well, we'll click on it and they're going to they're going to float it out and install something. 00:42:20:16 - 00:42:33:04 Speaker 2 Right. But it's with this type of, you know, in the product, I assume that it has to be a lot more exacting. And the, and the, the execution by the finishers at at the time of pour. Right. 00:42:33:04 - 00:43:04:21 Speaker 1 It's critical. I can't make I my success depends on their successful work. Yeah. And their very best practices and I we're and I'm working with a new builder on these projects. I send them a list of about ten companies that are my favorite, people to place concrete. And there are different levels of the price scale, but they're all expert, and they've all done dozens of of foundations that were meant to be finished floors. 00:43:04:23 - 00:43:28:15 Speaker 1 And on residential pours and sometimes commercial ones. I'll stand there that day and with my bad Spanish and I'll say, we need to have some more finishing over here in this area. Or that's your example right there where it's just starting to show a mirror. Finish a little bit of shine in the surface, a little bit of marbling. 00:43:28:17 - 00:44:02:07 Speaker 1 That's your. So it's a simple port for work. Sea glass is to a simple port. Toro is the piece. So, and I joke and I am respectful and I get good results that way. Yeah, but they're being asked to do their very best. And if I don't receive that, I. It's only happened twice, but there have been a couple times when I've had to say, I'm sorry, I can't, I can't work with this because it's junk. 00:44:02:09 - 00:44:26:08 Speaker 1 And that's when the builder just decided to use a third rate foundation company. We just can't we can't turn it into a great floor. Yeah, there are ten considerations going on there. And I have to say that usually the slab pour day is a stressful day for everybody. Some people have been up, some for it's it's, you know, it's a the somebody will discover at the last minute that there was a flaw plug left out. 00:44:26:13 - 00:44:51:18 Speaker 1 You know there wasn't installed has to be you know done now. Yeah. The engineers or the inspector has to come back to give it a like, you know, last look, etc.. As you know, and I'm usually of the 30 critical considerations, I'm number 31, you know, to get the esthetics right. But that's why intentionality is so important on these projects.