Rose Cottage Ltd

When it comes to a stucco project, playing in the sand takes on a whole new meaning.

This is not a clean and easy project. It’s hard work, with heavy lifting at times, and lots of reaching and bending. A few specific tools are absolutely necessary. Water – as both a tool and an ingredient – needs to also be at ready supply and access.

If you enter through the Contractor’s Entrance at any Lowe’s Home Improvement and bear left, you’ll likely find bins with most of the Masonry and concrete tools you’ll need – along with cement, sand, and lime (and usually some powdered concrete colorant,) stacked along the far wall. If you’re having a really lucky day, you might find a Masonry Professional enjoying a few spare minutes out of the weather and buying his own supplies – and he might be willing to give you some input if asked.

Toys, I mean tools…

Most of these were purchased at Lowe’s – many are Kobalt brand which proved to be a little more expensive but proved to be very sturdy. Bon-Tool (online) also has a huge assortment though a lot of their products are geared for the professional trade. I think most of these items are self-explanatory with a few notes.

A hawk was not purchased for this project – one was made by taking a section of shingle that happened to be lying around and nailing a block of wood centered on one side. This worked fine here, you may prefer to purchase.

The little winged Kobalt tool standing in the left upper corner of the mixing tray was supposed to be used for corners. I found it a waste of time. If your metal lath, scratch and brown coats are done with care, corners can be done with the other trowels.

I started with smaller trowels since the wall had separate and small sections anyway. I felt this work in my wrists and arm muscles for about the first two days. After that, and after gaining more confidence, I moved on to using more mixture, a larger trowel, and began getting stucco applied in a much more efficient manner.

The whisk broom was used to smooth the brown and finish coats – again this is based on your finish preference.

Most of these items run from $10 to $20 a piece. Throw in a tray to mix it all in and you’re ready to begin! All of this was mixed by hand. Until the arrival of the cement mixer…more on that purchase later… (Updated 11/14/2011)

For now, let’s figure out how to get this stuff on a wall…