Wasted $400 on a colored stamped concrete job that looked awful after one winter

I paid a guy $400 extra to add color to a stamped concrete patio I was pouring last fall. He used some liquid color hardener he swore by, said it would hold up for years. By spring that color was fading in patches and looked like a bad dye job. The salt from winter just ate right through it. I should have gone with a dry shake color hardener or just stuck with plain gray and sealed it well. Has anyone else had a colored concrete job go bad on them after just a few months of weather?

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theagarcia8d ago

You said the salt "ate right through it" and that's actually the real problem here, not the color hardener itself. Most colored concrete issues come from not sealing it properly before winter hits. A good quality sealer would have protected that color from the salt damage you're describing. I've seen dry shake color hardeners fail too if the sealer isn't maintained every couple years. Plain gray with a decent sealer probably would have looked better, but you still would have needed to keep up with resealing each year.