Hey everyone!
We are renovating our atelier to be a temporary house while we completely strip and redo the main house for a few years.
One thing I am really struggling with is how to make a large 255cm x 65cm dirty concreate workbench into a kitchen countertop for 2 years or so.
We are based in Belgium, so wood prices are about 2x what they are in the US (250cm x 125cm OSB board is 50€ or so).
The height is already quite high for a countertop (for me and my girlfriend it is perfect) so adding a thick slab of butcher block or something would make it unusable.
I don’t really know what my options are. Maybe a wood veneer? Some sort of cheap-ish tile?
We used some iron-on white to finish the edge of our custom sink cabinet made from some old office cupboards, maybe there are larger ones like that that would work for concrete?
We are trying to stay below 2cm thickness. Idealy 0.5cm or so, but that would be difficult.
If anyone has any ideas to throw out, we would be open to it! It is just temporary, so it doesn’t have to last more than a few years
Thanks!
Edit: I realized I didn’t have any good pictures of the bench itself since it always took a back seat, but here are a few bad ones to give an idea from in the beginning https://imgur.com/a/KgiqHrC
I would use a commercial concrete cleaner to remove any bad oil stains and then a solid sealer. Sika should make both of them and be available at the big DIY stores in the masonry section.
A well-sealed concrete countertop is a great work surface in a kitchen, though you might have to reseal it every year.
I looked into this and it seems there are 0 food safe concrete sealers available in Belgium that I can find. Strange.
I would look into grinding and sanding it flat and a resin coating to seal the surface. There are YouTube tutorials to DIY it if you are price conscious
Since this needs to last for 2 years you can add a thin epoxy layer to perfectly smooth out the surface and make it hospitable.
Can you upload a photo so we have an idea?
I realized I never took any great pictures of it since this was lower priority, but here is a few that I have that include the bench to give an idea https://imgur.com/a/KgiqHrC