A Man Who Has Nothing In Particular To Recommend Him Discusses All Sorts of Subjects at Random as Though He Knew Everything
When I was young, there was no vinyl siding. Many people in semi-urban areas had aluminum siding, and the burbs and anything rural were all painted. I remember the first time I saw the stuff. The fellow that sold it had a slogan: Vinyl is final!
He was right, you know. Just not like he meant.
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A Man Who Has Nothing In Particular To Recommend Him Discusses All Sorts of Subjects at Random as Though He Knew Everything
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Soon moving from a vinyl sided house to a wood shingle/slat house. Feeling better deep in my soul already. Someone should rewrite The Three Little Pigs and start the cautionary tale with a vinyl-sided house.
Alright, now you’ve done it and broached a subject that can cause me to shout incoherently at strangers from a street corner. Forget Democrat or Republican, Muslim or Christian, Cheney or Pelosi, the true measure of good and evil is whether you will or will not tolerate vinyl siding in a society that bills itself as civilized. A home with wood siding even when burned to the ground has some integrity. You can tell even in its ruin that it was once a home. I remember seeing a burned home clad in this “material” and it looked like a used sandwich bag discarded from a car window.
To play devil’s advocate: for many, vinyl siding is affordable…kind of like junk food.
I am looking for a home. I told the agents I have a few requirements. If the home they want to show me has aluminum or vinyl siding, forget it. I do not even want to see the thing. I also do not want a home that is built too tight. I want a home that will breathe. You would be surprised how many realtors pitch vinyl siding as a plus. I even know of cases where the agent has gotten people to put vinyl siding on a perfectly good home because if it is low maintenance it will sell faster. They forget how bad vinyl siding looks in just a couple of years.
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I guess I have to speak up for Vinyl. For many of us out here in the real world it is the only affordable option.
In the Northern Virginia area, where home prices are through the roof, wood siding is totally unaffordable and never even an option. Even if you could afford it, the heat and humidity would contribute to its very costly upkeep.
I appreciate the aesthetics of real wood but on this issue I’m a realist and I cannot criticize those who simply cannot afford wood and most often must settle for vinyl.
I also must disagree with my dear Apis’s analogy that vinyl is kind of like junk food. Sweet Bee, that has too many insulting implications. We can’t eat at Ruth’s Chris every night.
I’m very grateful that I can afford a vinyl sided house. I’m also grateful that I can appreciate the true beauty of houses built of all natural materials.
2:
Brick.
Apparently another joy I have yet to experience.
Vinyl is an attitude. One that says, “my house is an investment that I can leave sit for 15 years.”
I have seen dirty vinyl siding. Why clean it? It is maintenance-free.
While I think vynal siding is hideous, I do believe that Hardie plank siding is the best thing since sliced bread. I know, I have it on parts of my house and older hideous fiber board siding (70’s house) on other parts. Hardie plank takes and holds paint better than anything else, looks natural and will never rot. Eventually all of my house that’s exposed to weather will be clad in Hardie plank. Vynal or aluminum, no way.
I think my distaste for vinyl siding is partly distaste for dishonesty — it is obviously trying to look like wood siding. But I also have problems with the way it is used. When viewed with cross-light one can see easily where it sags, or hasn’t been installed well. Largely, though, my distaste is because good visual composition has been left out in most of the cases where it is used. Both of the photos above could have hardiplank on the walls, we really can’t tell from the photo. But one is elegant and one is not.