Spring is here!! With spring cleaning, donating and switching out seasonal clothing in my kids drawers, I am so excited to finally get outside. We are so excited for our outdoor projects that we are planning!! We are planning a concrete paint/stain project on our outdoor patio this spring. I went to Sherwin Williams to look at their concrete stains and was so impressed at their samples!

My color options
We are probably going to go with their paint/stain, not the acid stain. I have seen some of the most amazing acid stain jobs on concrete but I think for our patio and the fact that we usually DIY everything, we are going to go with the paint/stain. The very cool think about the Sherwin Williams concrete paint/stain is that you can pick whatever color they have in the store and they will tint your concrete paint that color. They didn’t tell me that when I originally sauntered in to Sherwin Williams last year asking questions about all of the different concrete stains. So……here comes the reason for my post!!! Is a lighter color better for a concrete stain because it won’t be hot on your bare feet, or would a darker color be better to hide the dirt? And….would it be too much to use the same color that I used on our house siding? Lighter might be prettier but dirtier? Ed hates it when concrete burns his feet. HA! It’s not like we have a pool:) Why do we have bare feet anyway? Hmmm……any suggestions?
- Before
- Underneath our Gazebo
The rug is actually a turf rug. It actually looks like an indoor Berber carpet. We got this a few years ago at Carpet Land and were very pleased with it because it was so large and I couldn’t find indoor/outdoor carpets this large. This is before power washing the concrete and rug! Spring cleaning is in order!
Hmmm…tough choices! Looking from left to right I like the third one over. It’s hard to tell the exact color, but it being darker will help cover dirts and stains. Although bare feet it can be hot for! Hmm, to look dirty or to be hot is the question to decide on ?? I pick dark and hot!
HAHA!! I know it’s a hard one! Thanks for the suggestion!
I need more pics to see the colors all together! Which color was your siding? I think one of the lighter colors would be better since you have a gazebo. If it’s too dark, it’ll be like a cave. Do you have any inspiration pics that you could share?
The color on the far right is the house color. The color on the far left is one notch lighter. That’s a good thought….feeling like a cave! It’s true the gazebo is dark and the furniture is dark too. I will put pictures up of the area since we just power washed this past weekend to get ready for it. Thanks for the suggestion!
Okay – here’s another idea… What if you stain the concrete a rich dark color? And then keep your outdoor rug, but stencil it with geometric pattern?! I think that could look good!
Ummm…..I think you had me at stencil! haha. I really like that idea! I wonder if the rug would take a stencil since it isn’t super flat. It is like a turf outdoor rug. I will have to do some testing…that would be a fun project!
What color did you decide to do? I have to do this in my Patio!
SW 7638 called ‘Jogging Path’ It is a lighter color. Outside it looks even lighter than the paint chip when the sun is out. I am happy with the color in the end:)