How to Do Brown Bag Flooring on Top of Concrete

Remove everything from the room and sweep the concrete floor thoroughly to remove all traces of dirt. Vacuum the edges of the floor with a vacuum hose to ensure no dirt remains in crevices or corners.

Fill a bucket with 1 gallon of water and 1 or 2 tsp. of trisodium phosphate, as indicated on the bottle. Mop the concrete floor using a sponge mop and scrubbing any visible areas of dirt, stains or grease.

Empty the bucket and refill it with clean water. Mop the floor with the clean water to rinse away the cleaning solution. Allow the floor to dry completely.

Tear brown bags up into various shapes of any size. Irregular shapes have a more attractive appearance than smaller strips. Create additional texture by crumpling the paper pieces up and then straightening them back out, if desired.

Walk to one corner of the concrete floor and open a can of clear polyurethane. Insert a paintbrush into the polyurethane and apply a small amount to the concrete.

Place one of the brown bag strips onto the polyurethane and then paint the top of it with more polyurethane until you've covered the bag strip completely.

Paint more polyurethane on the floor in a fresh spot and lay another piece of paper over it, overlapping the first piece by at least 1/4 to 1/2 inch. Paint the top of the paper with additional polyurethane.

Continue this process of installing paper pieces until no portion of the concrete remains visible.

Wait until the surface of the floor feels hard and is no longer sticky. Pour the remainder of the polyurethane into a paint tray, or open a new can if needed. Apply another coat of polyurethane to the floor using a paint roller with an extension handle.

Coat the floor with four more coats of polyurethane, waiting one hour in between each coat. Avoid walking on the floor for 24 hours to allow the floor to dry thoroughly.