hi everyone,

To revive this post a bit.

My concrete looking feature wall is done, but nothing to the effect of the above posted image. To put it simply, it is disastrous. When my frds and relatives came over, the typical response is: "How come your wall not yet finish eh?" I want to cry already. The best reaction i got is from my housing contractor. He came into my house, looked at the wall, and asked me :" So what are you intending to do with this wall, do nice nice design issit?". I look at him with a straight face and said " No, this is the final design. My concrete feature wall". He looks back, laugh and say:" Noooo lah, dun bluff me. Serious lah, you wanna put tiles issit?".

So now, my options is to buff off the concrete surface(there is a plaster board feature, and the concrete is screeded on it) and redo again cos the surface has started to crack. I will hate to do concrete screeding again. Is there any other options i have? The following options are not feasible:

1. Tiles. Its too heavy for plaster feature walls.

2. Metal Laminate. Its really, really expensive.

3. wallpaper. Think its quite redundant to put wallpaper on feature wall.

Any suggestions? Must be light weighted materials cos need to mount on feature wall...

paint ? if u tink it's too plain, maybe u can paint a design on it ? create a stencil using plastic and then sponge in the colours.

hi everyone,

To revive this post a bit.

My concrete looking feature wall is done, but nothing to the effect of the above posted image. To put it simply, it is disastrous. When my frds and relatives came over, the typical response is: "How come your wall not yet finish eh?" I want to cry already. The best reaction i got is from my housing contractor. He came into my house, looked at the wall, and asked me :" So what are you intending to do with this wall, do nice nice design issit?". I look at him with a straight face and said " No, this is the final design. My concrete feature wall". He looks back, laugh and say:" Noooo lah, dun bluff me. Serious lah, you wanna put tiles issit?". !!

So now, my options is to buff off the concrete surface(there is a plaster board feature, and the concrete is screeded on it) and redo again cos the surface has started to crack. I will hate to do concrete screeding again. Is there any other options i have? The following options are not feasible:

1. Tiles. Its too heavy for plaster feature walls.

2. Metal Laminate. Its really, really expensive.

3. wallpaper. Think its quite redundant to put wallpaper on feature wall.

Any suggestions? Must be light weighted materials cos need to mount on feature wall...

Hi itarc, may I know how long ago did you do this cement screed wall before fine cracks start to appear?? Any pictures of your wall??

If yours is like the pictures above (square panels), how about u use each as a frame and mount light weight pictures or paintings in the center?? Or to go with the contrast, mount B&W photos and shine spotlights.. Just my 2 cents worth..

hello i'm going to do somethig like what you have for my new home soon. its cool. sadly, not many contractor in sin can do this. still exploring the best way to achieve this effect. the original style came from this japanese master call tadao ando. the actual method is to precast the concrete slab and mount onto the wall. hdb will definitely not allow this.

i'm exploring

1. cement board - screen a layer of cement over it and drill the 4 holes.

2. ask carpenter to do up the "boxes" and cement screen over it.

lastly, if you like what you have. stick with it. this kind of style and treatment is an aquired taste. not many people appreciate and can have kind of treatment in their house.

do you have any photo of yr wall?

there's supply of cement board readily available, which are used by IDs for this kinda feature wall.. the actual name is glass reinforced concrete (GRC) boards. these boards are precast with fibreglass inset in concrete.. normal portland cement screed will defintely crack.. itarc's ID/ contractor should have used these instead of gypsum plaster board and then cement screeding over thereafter...

hello

thanks. will check with my id on this. any idea how do we achieve the 4 holes? do the GRC board come with it?

those are drill holes delibrately drilled in that positions and left behind unfilled with cement my dear..

hehe ya i know.... tot maybe there are really made ones around. any idea if hdb allows cast concrete stabs to be mounted onto the wall?

Itarc,

so sorry to hear that you do not like the wall... what is wrong with it besides the cracking? Truth be said, I think that there must be some allowance for hairline crack because that is a common scene although I have seen some cement screeding that is perfect and has been that way for years.

If you want to see what you can do about it, you can go the the My Humble House (under the Tung Lok Group) at Esplanade. They have what you are trying to achieve I believe with an additional plus.. Look carefully on the wall and you can see inbuilt lights. I recommend that you take a look first, ask the restaurant who they got to do the wall and ask them for advice on how to do it properly should you want to do it again. If not, at least they might be able to rectify your faults.

Cheers

Gate