The texture of the initial pool deck had what’s known as a “salt” finish. In this technique, before the concrete dries, large chunks of rock salt are thrown over it and then smoothed over with a trowel. The trowelling step is important because it causes the salt chunks to press down on the still-hardening concrete, and it determines what the final texture will look like. When the concrete is dry, the salt is power-washed, which causes it to dissolve away. All that’s left of the salt chunks are the indentations they leave behind.
Usually, the uneven, randomly dispersed holes created by a salt finish are aesthetically pleasing. But in this case, the trowelling was sloppily done and the texture looked like a hot mess. Since there is no real way to fix a messed up texture job once its dried and cured, we were hired to apply a skim coating of concrete over the entire area to get rid of it and start fresh.