How to Keep Up With Cedar Roofs

By Cayden Wemple. 

Cedar requires a great deal of maintenance. Roofing experts discuss synthetic alternatives to cedar roofs. 

Cedar roofs can be a gorgeous choice for your roofing needs, however, like all wood products, it needs to be maintained. And that’s especially true if you’re in humid environments. Andy Langham of Langham & Son’s Roofing told the Roofing Road Trips podcast that synthetics are becoming a more popular option especially since the onset of COVID and the tariffs that have come with it. “Real wood products are really 15-to-20-year products if they're not taken care of,” says Andy. “And no one maintains a roof anymore. They don't think about it once it's over their head.” 

In places where there is a lot of humidity, such as where Brandon is in the southern United States, cedar roofs need to be checked on more frequently. “Here, we have 20% humidity in the morning. Can be 80% in the afternoon and back to 10% that night. So with cedar taking on and giving off moisture so rapidly, the grains swell and the product tends to try to curl,” Brandon said.  

A cedar roof is always changing and so is its color. That’s why DaVinci Roofscapes is always on top of making a roof seem like it’s brand new by offering synthetic alternatives that look like real wood but requires less maintenance.  

“Cedar, during its life cycle, changes so rapidly,” says Brandon. “The color changes. Everything changes. With this product [DaVinci synthetic roofing], we're very color fast. So the big thing when we talk design with a homeowner is what color and cedar and lifecycle do you want? Because we have colors in all of our pallets that'll do all of those things for you. So if you want cedar that's been on a house for five years, we have the color that works for that...” 

As homeowners consider a synthetic alternative to a real cedar roof, it’s important to remind them that the color won’t alter once it’s installed. Brandon shares, “We try to make sure that we coach our homeowners to understand that ...it's not going to change over time. It's going to look like it does the day it went on 10 years down the road, 20 years down the road.”  

Learn more about DaVinci Roofscapes in their RoofersCoffeeShop® Directory or visit DaVinciRoofscapes.com. 

You can learn more about cedar roof maintenance by listening to the full podcast here. 

About Cayden  

Cayden is a reporter for RoofersCoffeeShop, MetalCoffeeShop and AskARoofer. When he isn’t writing about roofs, he’s usually playing guitar or writing songs for his musical endeavors.