CTX BasicKeramik® RES Cemento Grigio

The “Cemento Grigio” design takes up the look of classic fair-faced concrete (“cemento” in Italian) in a mid grey tonality and translates it into a technically high-grade porcelain surface. The slab pattern shows an authentic mid grey concrete ground tone with a subtle, very natural-looking mottling — lighter and somewhat darker tonal fields form soft light-dark transitions, discreet smudge and water-trace effects and occasionally recognisable “mortar inhomogeneities” that recall cast fair-faced concrete, smoothly rendered industrial surfaces or finely floated wall surfaces. The impression is calm, urban-industrial and restrained in design terms — a deliberately non-decorative stage for modern architecture.

This very restraint in design is the strength of the material. Cemento Grigio does not compete with furniture fronts, timber surfaces, textiles or lighting concepts, but acts as a reliably calm architectural background. In modern kitchens, urban-minimalist living concepts, hospitality and commercial architecture, that is often exactly the material statement wanted. Combined with warm timber (oak, ash, walnut), black steel, brushed brass, Corten steel and reduced colour palettes, the fair-faced concrete look develops a contemporary, elegant atmosphere that convinces in both residential and commercial architecture.

Technically it is a fully through-sintered large-format porcelain, manufactured in the classic high-pressure, high-temperature sintering process: mineral raw materials (natural clays, feldspars, quartzes and pigments) are pressed under high pressure into a large-format slab and sintered at temperatures above 1,200 °C. The result is a chemically non-reactive, virtually pore-free ceramic material with a water absorption of < 0.1 %. The material properties are those of the premium porcelain class: full UV stability (released for exterior applications), acid resistance (wine, lemon and vinegar leave no etch marks), heat resistance (hot pans can be set down directly), scratch resistance (Mohs hardness 7–8), frost resistance and food safety.

In direct comparison with genuine fair-faced concrete, RES Cemento Grigio offers concrete advantages: no open porosity (real concrete is columnar-porous and takes up stains), no chalking or sintering shrinkage, no impregnation cycles, a precisely reproducible look (real concrete differs from batch to batch), full acid resistance (real concrete is very acid-sensitive) and large-format availability without formwork joints. Anyone who wants the concrete look in a technically consistently designed, everyday-capable quality is therefore better served by a porcelain reproduction than by genuine fair-faced concrete.

At ROSSITTIS we currently carry CTX BasicKeramik® RES Cemento Grigio as 22 large-format slabs in 12 mm thickness with a naturale matt surface — the standard finish for fair-faced concrete looks, which gives the appearance its authentically matt, slightly dull character. On request we produce from these kitchen worktops, splashbacks, vanity tops, wall and floor tiles, outdoor kitchen counters, pool surrounds, façade elements, table surfaces and project-specific special cuts. The 12 mm thickness is the classic worktop and vanity top thickness of the porcelain class.

For anyone comparing RES Cemento Grigio with other materials: stylistically close are Laminam Fokos (especially Fokos Piombo and Fokos Cenere), Diresco BU011 Belgian Fog (a UV-stable engineered quartz with a similarly pale concrete tonality), the Concrete line from Optimum Surfaces, and the concrete-look designs from Florim, ABK and Atlas Concorde. Anyone looking for a warmer or darker concrete tone will find further Cemento versions at CTX BasicKeramik® (lighter in Cemento Avorio, for instance, or darker in Cemento Antracite). Genuine fair-faced concrete remains the choice for purist architectural concepts with “raw” authenticity — Cemento Grigio is the easy-care, technically consistent alternative.

Our honest assessment: CTX BasicKeramik® RES Cemento Grigio is an outspokenly versatile choice for projects that want to set a calm, urban accent with a modern fair-faced concrete look — with the full robustness of porcelain, indoors AND out. Anyone looking for maximum geological authenticity should reach for genuine fair-faced concrete or genuine pale natural stone (Pietra Serena). But anyone who wants the precise, controlled concrete look in an easy-care, heat- and acid-resistant large-format quality — and wants to make use of the economically attractive costing of a ROSSITTIS house brand — will find a very coherent solution here.