Block of the Month: Concrete Powder

Many Minecraft players build out of whatever the nearest material to hand is. That might be dirt, cobblestone, netherrack, or something else. I’ve even seen a house made of clay, which is sure to result in a sticky situation before too long. 

But other players like to take a little more care with their constructions – building out of bricks, carefully-selected woods or planks, polished stone, or colorful concrete. It’s this last choice that we’re looking at today – because our block of the month is the raw material you’ll need to make it. It’s concrete powder!

Concrete powder was added to Minecraft in the World of Color update in June 2017, which also added glazed terracotta, illusioners, and parrots. It’s made using four blocks of sand and four blocks of gravel, as well as a single type of dye. 

The dye is what gives concrete its color – so there are sixteen possibilities to choose. They go all the way from bright orange to dark blue, taking in magenta, red, cyan, gray, white and black along the way.

Concrete powder, as it’s made of sand and gravel, is affected by gravity – it’ll fall if you place it in the world without a block below it. To keep it in place, you’ll need to turn it into concrete – which is done by bringing it into contact with water - either place it into the water, or allow water to flow next to it.

Note that it’ll need to be a full block of water – water bottles or rain won’t have any effect. Oh, and you need to actually place the block into the world – throwing concrete powder into water in item form won’t do a thing.

Image credit: Oussama zrafi // CC BY-SA 3.0

Want to know something kinda mind-blowing? Concrete is the second-most-used substance on Earth after water. We use twice as much concrete every day than we use steel, wood, plastic and aluminum combined. 

Where does all that concrete go? Into construction, mostly. When you mix cement with sand, gravel and water you get a super-strong material that can be cast into almost any shape. There are many different kinds that come with very different properties, all based on what goes into the mix – from asphalt concrete for roads, to concrete reinforced with microbes, or even sci-fi materials like graphene.

Some people don’t like the look of concrete buildings, but many others appreciate their brutalist aesthetic. It’s even possible to polish the concrete to expose its structure, making it more attractive to the eye.

Whatever the reason for concrete’s enduring popularity, it’s definitely worth a look as a building material in Minecraft – it’s cheap to make, fun to build with, comes in all kinds of colors, and we promise that it won’t burn down under any circumstances. If that’s not something to get excited about, I don’t know what is!