Furniture for your deck or patio needs to satisfy a few demands. It needs to look good and be comfortable, but most importantly, it needs to stand up to the elements. The furniture on your patio or deck will be exposed to constant wind, sun, rain, and other weather. Even if you take your furniture into a shed or storage unit when you’re not using it, those are likely drafty and less climate-controlled than your house. The humidity in your storage area will be high enough to cause your furniture to mould, mildew, rust, and corrode. Therefore, you need to make sure your furniture is made of the right materials. In many cases, you won’t be able to shield your furniture from the elements. For example, a stone or cement table is much too heavy to move when you’re not using it.
Cement Furniture
Cement is a fairly common material used for outdoor furniture in Melbourne. Cement is often used since it is affordable, stable, and attractive. If you buy a cement table, you don’t have to worry about the table getting damaged from day-to-day use. You also don’t have to worry about it getting damaged by condensation from glasses or from humidity. Cement is a porous material since it is made of pulverised rocks, but it does not degrade very readily in the presence of moisture. You will need to keep it as dry as possible since the porous nature will allow mould and mildew to develop over time. If you can’t keep it dry, you can easily clean it.
You can pressure wash cement furniture to clean it in a few seconds. It stands up to high water pressure, high heat, and much more.
Aluminium
Aluminium is a common material for patio and deck furniture. It is a metal so it is sturdy and resilient, but it is also has a lightweight quality to it. Therefore, you could conceivably move your aluminium furniture in and out of the house when you need to use it. Furthermore, aluminium is a nonferrous metal, meaning it does not contain iron. Since it does not contain iron, it does not rust if it gets rained on. You’ll need to watch out for corrosion on the aluminium furniture, though, for many aluminium applications still use steel nuts and bolts. You’ll need to watch for rust on them as well.
Synthetic Wood
Synthetic wood is not one material, but a wide range of materials. Typically, the exact formula for a company’s synthetic wood is proprietary. However, most of them rely on some kind of latex-based product. The product is waterproof and lightweight. It’s designed to look and feel like real wood. Typically, a good synthetic wood is designed to look and feel like teak. As a very dense wood, teak is used for outdoor furniture, boats, and other weather-resistant applications. That makes it a popular inspiration for faux wood.
Unlike actual wood, synthetic wood will not absorb water and degrade over time. It’s also typically lighter in weight than regular wood.
Any of these materials would make for great furniture.