Does low maintenance decking look too much like plastic for your taste? Real wood is difficult to imitate, but artificial decking is hard to beat in its longevity.
Getting the best of both worlds: making your outdoor living space look natural and "biophilic" comes down to a few major factors, and a few minor ones.
Decking Collection
Many collections of decking, especially those with fine variegation and more intricate texturing, mimic weathered wood coloring and texture. Some collections even use a printed wood pattern that looks identical to wood grain.
Some collections actually vary the fill color to be different board-to-board, which makes boards different shades than each other, but still close enough for the decking to have a cohesive look.
Solid-color or monotone decking, which tends to be more price-friendly than variegated-color decking, is created with a consistent color throughout the board, and is a great option if you don't mind the "painted wood" look. Without color variation, the texture is more noticeable, and may look repeated, and more "manufactured".
Azek Vintage, Deckorators Voyage, Deckorators Venture, and Trex Transcend Lineage all feature a finely-streaked coloring that looks more natural.
Trex Signature is a composite board with a printed woodgrain pattern that looks identical to a smooth, oiled wood, but with a lightly textured surface.
Trex Select, Timbertech Edge Premier, and Trex Enhance Basics are all solid-color decking collections that are monotone color boards with a simple texture that will look more like a painted board.
There are many other collections that fall into or between these groups, each with their own unique qualities and price levels.
Decking Color Choice
Some colors look more like warm wood or grayed-out wood decking, inherently making them look more natural. Bright colors like golden tan, orangish brown, and cool or bluish gray may look out of place in your natural backyard environment, but are often chosen because they match home color schemes.
Dirt and Wear
Most items that are bought brand new look clean and crisp and even shiny, and to some extent decks will feel this way. Being an outdoor product, decks will get dusty, wet, dirty, and will show traffic patterns.
If you like a clean deck surface with no traffic patterns, you can more regularly clean the areas that get walked over most, and it will stay looking newer.
If you want your deck to fit into your backyard space more, a little dirt may actually help. Decking and fascia are textured mainly for traction, but also to look realistic. Once dirt and dust get into the texture, it highlights the texturing pattern and may make it look even more like real wood. Timbertech Reserve and Fiberon Sanctuary are two great examples.
Ultimately, it comes down to you and your choice of decking and cleaning habits that determine what your deck is going to look like in the long run.
