Services
The finish menu
01
New three-coat stucco — $15.80 / sq ft
Scratch, brown and color over paper-backed lath, in cement or lime to suit the wall and the weather it faces. Sand matched to the valley quarry, and the texture struck from a sample panel you keep.
02
EIFS restoration — $41 / sq ft
Non-destructive scanning first, invasive probes only where it matters: foam, mesh and base coat replaced exactly where the readings say so. The elevation keeps its insulation and loses its secret.
03
Mineral re-color — $3.90 / sq ft
Silicate finishes that bond chemically to the stucco instead of filming on top of it — vapor-open, UV-stable, and recoated in fifteen years by choice rather than necessity.
04
Trim, bands & quoins — $24 / lin ft
Coated EPS profiles cut to the drawing, struck level, meshed into the field. The details are what make a stucco wall read as architecture instead of as a finish.
What we do
Three crafts, one crew
The three-coat system
Scratch for grip, brown for plane, color for face — each cured on its own clock. The brown coat is rodded to a string line until the wall is true, because every defect under the color coat is a shadow at five in the afternoon, forever.
Moisture-mapped EIFS repair
Scan first, probe second, open only what the readings condemn. Most coastal EIFS damage is a trim detail leaking into the foam — we fix the detail and the damage in the same opening, so neither comes back next winter.
Mineral color, aging well
Lime and silicate finishes matte down gracefully instead of peeling in sheets. Ten years on, a mineral wall shows weather; a filmed wall shows failure. We keep samples of both in the van to prove it.
Measured, then troweled
The practice, in figures
Owners
Piedra Vista, on the record
They left the sample panel bolted to our garage for a month. Three weeks later the batch matched it in sun, in fog and under the porch light at night — our architect photographed the finished wall for her own portfolio.
The scan said the EIFS damage was a five-foot problem, not the whole gable the other quote wanted. Solano opened exactly what the readings condemned, and the texture match has fooled two painters so far.
Our 1968 lime walls were chalky and patched by three decades of previous owners. They consolidated, filled and re-colored in the original tone, and the house breathes the way lime is supposed to — no blister after two coastal summers.
Before the visit
Fair questions
The five the first visit usually raises — anything else, the number below reaches the studio between eight and six.
Lime or cement stucco?
Cement is the workhorse and the price on the card; lime moves with a coastal wall, self-heals hairline cracks and catches light differently. On the Arrellano coast we push lime for anything pre-1980 and lime-cement blends elsewhere — the sample panel decides, not the margin.
What does mineral color cost to maintain?
A wash every few years and, in fifteen to twenty, another coat. Because silicate bonds into the mineral wall instead of filming on it, there is nothing to peel — recoating is a wash and a roll, not a strip and a scaffold.
Can EIFS be repaired without removing it?
When the damage is localized — and the moisture map says when, not the eye. If the readings show saturation across an elevation, partial repair is money spent twice; we will tell you so and lose the job before we sell you the wrong one.
How do you match an existing wall?
A sample panel mixed from pigment at the studio, bolted beside the old wall and left through weather. Twenty-eight days is the honest match; anything faster is a guess with a trowel in its hand.
When can you start?
Four to six weeks out in season, sooner for repairs. The visit happens within the week — and the survey, the readings and the sample panel are yours whatever you then decide.
Book the wall visit
We come with the scanner, the probe kit and sample panels, read the wall in your own light, and leave the survey with you. Evenings and Saturdays suit most coastal houses. walls@solanofinishes.example