Composite decking colours explained

Decking colour is the decision people most often change their mind about, usually after the boards arrive. It is worth ten minutes now. We make our composite decking in eight woodgrain finishes, four warm and four cool. This guide describes each one honestly, including which show dirt, which suit which house, and what every one of them does in its first six months outdoors.

The short answer

Grey if you want the safe choice that goes with anything and hides wear. Teak if you want the deck to read as wood at a glance. Oak for a period house with brick and stone. Black or Chocolate for a modern garden where the deck is a backdrop for planting. Ash or Silver for a small or shaded garden that needs to feel light. Then order samples and look at them outside, because screens lie about all of them.

The warm finishes

Finish	What it looks like	Suits	Shows
Oak	Honeyed, traditional, the closest to a freshly oiled timber deck	Period houses, red brick, sandstone paving, cottage gardens	Very forgiving of dust and pollen; shows green algae in deep shade
Teak Brown	Rich mid-brown with a pronounced grain, the classic decking colour	Almost any house; the safest choice if you want it to read as wood	Hides footprints and mud well
Red Brown	Warmer and redder than Teak, closer to a cedar or mahogany tone	Red brick, terracotta pots, Mediterranean-style planting	Hides mud; shows pale dust slightly more than Teak
Chocolate	The darkest brown we do	Framing a garden rather than blending into it; makes planting look greener by contrast	Shows dust and pollen sooner than mid-tones; suits a deck that gets swept

The cool finishes

Finish	What it looks like	Suits	Shows
Ash	The palest: a cool, driftwood grey-green	Small or enclosed gardens that need to feel open; coastal and Scandinavian looks	Shows dust less than the darker boards; shows mud more
Silver	A lighter, cooler grey with a soft sheen, bright without being stark	Shaded gardens, north-facing patios, modern rendered houses	Similar to Ash; wet leaves mark it until swept
Grey	A true mid grey, our most popular finish	Any house and any furniture; the neutral that hides wear better than either extreme	The most forgiving of the eight
Black	Properly dark and modern, near-charcoal	The sharpest backdrop for planting; contemporary gardens with pale paving	Shows dust, pollen and pale dried mud sooner than any other; suits a swept deck

They all lighten a little at first

Every composite board lightens subtly over the first few months as tannins in the wood fibre react to daylight, then it stabilises and holds. This catches people out, so to be plain: the board you unwrap is slightly darker than the board you will have in six months. It is not fading and it is not a fault. It is the finish settling, and it is covered by the 10 year warranty either way.

Buy for the settled colour, not the day-one colour. If you are torn between two shades, the darker one usually lands where you wanted. This matters most with Black, which settles to a deep charcoal rather than a jet black, and with Chocolate, which settles a shade towards Teak.

Matching the house

• Red brick: Oak, Teak Brown or Red Brown pick up the warmth. Grey works as a deliberate contrast. Ash can look cold against red brick.
• Buff or yellow brick, Cotswold stone: Oak and Ash both sit naturally. Chocolate frames it.
• White or grey render, modern build: Grey, Silver or Black. Teak looks slightly out of place against white render unless the furniture is timber too.
• Existing timber fencing: Teak Brown or Oak if the fence is stained brown; Grey or Ash if the fence is silvering or painted grey.
• Pale paving next to the deck: a darker board gives a clean edge. A pale board next to pale paving can blur into one surface.

Matching trims, fascia and end caps

Cut board ends are hollow, and an exposed one looks unfinished. We do fascia boards, L-trims and step edges in matching finishes, and end caps at £1.49 each for Ash, Oak, Teak, Black, Grey and Chocolate, one for each board end on show. Silver and Red Brown have no cap in the range, so plan those edges to finish against a wall, under an L-trim, or behind a fascia.

Composite cladding comes in seven of the same finishes, so a garden room or a boundary wall can match the deck exactly.

Two-tone decks

A picture-frame border in a contrasting colour, such as Black around Grey or Chocolate around Oak, is the cheapest way to make a plain deck look designed. It also hides the cut ends of the field boards. The installation guide covers how to build the border run.

Look at them outdoors

Screens flatten these colours, and garden light changes them more than you would expect. Order free decking samples, put them where the deck is going, and look at them in the morning and again at dusk. Wet one of them. Stand a plant pot on another. The one you keep going back to is the answer, and it is very often not the one you would have picked from a photograph.