If you can dream it, a concrete form can be built for it. That goes for products designed for underground applications as well as products that rise high above the ground. For example, there are architectural precast concrete forms that are every bit as durable and functional as they are beautiful to look at. While Columbia Precast specializes in products for buried infrastructure, we thought we’d take a moment to appreciate the architectural side of precast.
Concrete is among the world’s oldest building materials, and the idea of pouring concrete into molds is just as old. However, the modern precast concrete industry really began to take shape within the last 100 years or so.
Since that time, things have really taken off, and the industry is now bigger and stronger than ever. It provides builders with potential cost savings on high-quality (and often high-rise) office building construction. There are many colors and textures that design teams can incorporate into their plans, plus the fire resistance and other attributes of concrete.
And the industry continues to grow. This is in large part due to the factors mentioned above. But it’s also due to increasing awareness of precast concrete as a solution to a wide range of infrastructural and construction challenges.
The fact that this type of concrete is customizable, reproducible, and eco-friendly in its production also plays an important role in spreading the word, too.
So when construction scheduling is underway and precast concrete wall panels (or precast concrete panels for other applications) are on the blueprints, get in touch with a concrete producer right away.
Precast Concrete: Architectural Forms
The term architectural precast concrete is of modern coinage.
As the Precast/Prestressed Concrete Institute (PCI) writes, “Precast concrete is the perfect medium for architecture. The use of color, form, and texture allows for unlimited creativity that evokes the beautiful natural expression of the material. The aesthetic appearance of architectural precast concrete is infinite. With the choice of aggregates, form liners, pigments, and textures, the architect can achieve a variety of design objectives.”
Similarly, the Architectural Precast Association says that “Precast concrete allows for very flexible design, limited only by the imagination.”
We couldn’t agree more.
Like a lot of our colleagues in the concrete trade, Columbia Precast Concrete specializes in concrete forms that are versatile, durable, and eco-friendly.
We admire architectural precast concrete while focusing on our own expertise, which allows us to focus on our own particular strengths and capacities. Namely, we manufacture concrete vaults, sewer pipes, traffic barriers, catch basins, baffles, and a tremendous range of products.
