Making your garage an extension of your living space In a time not too long ago, garages were all the same: outbuildings that were storage areas for parked cars, with boring gray concrete or even dirt floors. Today garages have taken a more prominent place in the design of homes, often built to house three vehicles, and more often than not attached to the home. Garages have graduated from simple storage areas, becoming organized shops or showrooms. Today every bit of attention that a homeowner pays to the decorating of the home is paid to the garage as well, right down to what goes on the concrete floors.

The growing trend to customize residential garages seems to have generated in the Southwest, where mild weather encouraged people to spend time in their garages. With the addition of evaporative coolers and special heating systems, garages became useable in all corners of the U.S., in all kinds of weather. As garages became extensions of living spaces, the organizational needs for the garages evolved as well. One of the first steps in customizing garages, the addition of custom cabinets, may have led to the popularity of garage floor coatings. "An unlikely friend to the garage floor is custom garage cabinets," says Kirk Stokes at Key Resin West in Phoenix. "With people getting more organized and wanting cleaner and better looking garages, it's only natural that they would want to upgrade the look of the floor as well."

Now homeowners no longer have to settle for boring, gray concrete flooring. Their garage floors can be as aesthetically pleasing as the rest of their home.