Properties
Western Red Cedar shingles and shakes have been used for hundreds of years and have proven their durability in all kinds of climates. They can be used to create individual buildings, whether traditional or modern, and their rich, warm colour and texture blend beautifully in any natural environment. The natural effects of aging and weathering give shingles and shakes, in time, an attractive silvery grey colour.
Western Red Cedar shingles and shakes are renowned for their insulation qualities, dimensional stability and natural resistance to the elements. Cedar shakes and shingles contain a natural preservative making them uncommonly durable in their natural state. They can also be supplied pressure treated with preservative for enhanced durability or fire retardant treated where required.
Western Red Cedars unique cellular composition makes a roof or wall of shakes and shingles a natural barrier to heat and cold, providing a high degree of thermal insulation. Proper application of cedar shingles and shakes gives outstanding rigidity and resilience against extreme weather including high winds and pounding hail.
A feature unique to cedar shingles is their flexibility. This enables them to follow complex contours in an architects design in both internal and external applications.
A Natural Environmental Choice
Concerns about the environmental impact of the production and use of building materials have focused the attention of architects and builders on the need to specify products which minimize atmospheric pollution and are produced from renewable resources. Western Red Cedar and other species in British Columbia's forests are harvested under a sustained yield policy which guarantees forest regeneration and biological diversity. Cedar shake and shingle production, which is virtually pollution free, is a secondary operation utilizing waste residuals from British Columbia's main logging and sawmilling industry. Clearly Western Red Cedar shingles and shakes are the optimum environmental choice of roofing and cladding materials.
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