DIY Concrete Countertops: Forms

Here at DDHRanch, we believe in being resourceful so it is no surprise that when it comes to kitchen counters we made our own concrete countertops!

Here is the list of supplies needed:

• Melamine 4×8 sheets
• Thin plywood 4×8 sheet
• 2-inch styrofoam
• Miter Saw
• Glue gun and glue
• Acetone with a cloth
• 100% Silicone
• Paste Wax
• Corner and Seam Shaper
• Under Mount Sink
• Kitchen Faucet

I did a lot of research before deciding that I could actually pull off making my own concrete countertops, in that research, I was lead to a site called Concrete Exchange. This site was a huge resource to me, they have videos and descriptions and walkthroughs for each step. So I will give you a quick overview here of what I did to go from start to finish.

The first step is to decide if you are going to pour your concrete countertops in place or informs and move them. I decided to pour them into forms and then place them afterward. So I had to make forms and to make sure they were the correct shape/size I used some thin boards to make a template of the counter space, then I flipped them upside down on a sheet of melamine.  the reason for this is because the plastic membrane is waterproof so when you pour the wet concrete in the form it doesn’t soak into the wood. The reason that you flip it upside down is that then you get a really nice smooth surface on the top. 

Then to make the forms you cut melamine into 2-inch strips (I wanted 2 inch thick counters) to make your form walls. These go right up against the templates so that when these are removed your forms are the correct size and shape.

To secure the form walls I used a hot glue gun to seal the whole length on the walls on the outside which held perfectly. (I was nervous about that but it worked amazingly well) The glue gun I used can be found here!

One important note is that with the walls you want to make sure that if you have an inside corner that your use a miter saw to cut it so that the membrane is the only thing that the concrete will touch. (as seen above) If the concrete touches the wood then you will have problems.

As you can see in the pictures above, I did a large pour and had 5 different forms to do at once which is quite a lot.

I had to do this in my dining and living rooms because at my house I don’t have a garage and there isn’t space anywhere else in my house. Plus I was pouring this towards the end of winter and the weather was not predictable so outside was not an option.

After you finish placing the walls, take out the templates. At this point, I cleaned the inside of the forms with acetone that you can get here. Then to seal the inside of the walls and create a round edge I used silicone that you can get here it needs to me 100% silicone and I suggest getting black. Before putting it on I wiped on the walls and base wax to release the excess silicone which I’ll get to in a minute, you can get the wax here. The way I made clean round edges was using these plastic dowels that are cut at an angle, you can buy these here. They helped a ton to move things along and make everything uniform. After using the dowel to create a round edge there is excess silicone that I had to remove which is why I waxed the wall and base.

The last step in making the forms is to add any inserts you may need. For me, I bought a large under mount sink from Amazon which can be found here and the faucet I used is the one you can find here. For both of these pieces, I needed to have a hole in the concrete countertops the exact size of each. The sink came with a template and I cut 2 inch insulation foam to fill the sink space. This then was taped around the edge with packing tape and the sealed to the base with silicone like the walls. Faucets have a couple of different sizes, mine is a 2.5 inch I believe and so that is the form piece that I bought here.

Once those are in place you have your forms finished and ready to go.

Make sure to read the next step here.

If you have any questions on anything that I did here or if I missed explaining something please post your question in the comments at the bottom of this page and I will do my best to answer them for you!

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