Lynden Cedar Has Real Appeal — We're Not Pretending Otherwise
Cedar siding has a warm, natural look that no manufactured product perfectly replicates. It's a renewable material, it takes stain and finish beautifully when new, and plenty of older homes around Lynden and the rest of Whatcom County still wear their original cedar with pride. If you love that look, we understand why. This page isn't an attack on cedar as a material — it's an honest explanation of why we, as a siding contractor working in this specific climate, stopped installing it.
Our decision comes down to one thing: what cedar demands from a homeowner over the next 20-30 years versus what a fiber cement system demands. In a marine climate with driving rain, high humidity, and a long moss season, that gap is bigger than most people expect when they're standing in a showroom looking at a beautiful cedar sample.
The Whatcom County Climate Problem
Lynden sits close enough to the Salish Sea and Puget Sound that salt-laden air is a real factor on exterior materials, and our weather pattern doesn't do wood siding any favors. We get long stretches of driving rain pushed in by Pacific systems, mild temperatures that never really dry things out for long, and shaded, damp conditions that are close to ideal for moss and algae growth for much of the year. Cedar is a natural, permeable wood product, and it responds directly to all three of those conditions.
Wood siding needs to dry out between rain events to stay healthy. In a climate where a "dry week" in November or February is not guaranteed, cedar boards can stay damp longer than they should, especially on north-facing walls, under eaves with poor overhang, or anywhere airflow is restricted by landscaping or fencing. That sustained moisture is what drives most of the problems we see with cedar siding on local homes.
Moss Season Isn't a Minor Inconvenience
Whatcom County's moss season effectively runs from fall through spring. On cedar, moss and algae don't just sit on the surface — given enough time, they hold moisture against the wood and contribute to surface breakdown, staining, and softening in the areas they colonize. Keeping cedar siding genuinely moss-free means regular washing, sometimes with treatments, and staying on top of it before growth gets established rather than after.
What Cedar Siding Actually Requires Over Time
This is the part that doesn't always get spelled out clearly when cedar siding is being sold. It's not a "install it and forget it" product. To get a normal lifespan out of cedar in this climate, a homeowner is signing up for an ongoing maintenance relationship with their siding:
- Refinishing on a cycle: Stain or paint on cedar breaks down under UV and moisture exposure and typically needs to be refreshed every 3-7 years depending on the finish type and exposure.
- Moss and algae control: Periodic gentle washing (and sometimes treatment) to keep growth from establishing, particularly on shaded or north-facing walls.
- Caulk and joint inspection: Checking seams, butt joints, and trim intersections yearly since wood movement can open gaps that let water behind the siding.
- Board replacement: Individual boards that develop rot, cupping, or splitting need to be caught and replaced before the damage spreads to sheathing or framing.
- Careful attention to grade and landscaping: Cedar close to soil, mulch beds, or dense plantings stays damp longer and deteriorates faster, so clearances have to be maintained.
None of these tasks are unreasonable on their own. The issue is the combination, repeated year after year, in a climate that doesn't give the wood much of a break to dry out. Homeowners who go in expecting a "natural, low-fuss" material are often surprised by how much of a maintenance commitment it turns into after year five or six.
Moisture Behavior: Where Wood and Fiber Cement Diverge
The core technical issue with cedar in our climate is moisture cycling. Wood absorbs and releases moisture with the weather, expanding and contracting as it does. Over repeated cycles, that movement stresses finishes, opens hairline gaps at joints, and — if drying can't keep pace with wetting — creates the conditions for rot, either on the surface or, worse, hidden behind the siding where it isn't caught until damage is significant.
Fiber cement doesn't behave the same way. It's dimensionally stable, doesn't absorb water the way wood does, and isn't a food source for the organisms that colonize damp wood surfaces. That's not a marketing claim — it's the basic material difference that drives our decision. In a dry climate, cedar's moisture cycling is a much smaller concern. In Whatcom County, it's the central issue.
A Side-by-Side Look
| Factor | Cedar Siding | James Hardie Fiber Cement |
|---|---|---|
| Moisture response | Absorbs and releases water; prone to swelling/cupping in sustained damp conditions | Dimensionally stable, engineered to resist moisture-related damage |
| Moss/algae resistance | No inherent resistance; wood surface supports growth | Not a food source for organic growth; far less prone to colonization |
| Refinishing cycle | Typically every 3-7 years | ColorPlus factory finish rated for decades; no refinishing for the life of the finish warranty |
| Combustibility | Combustible wood product | Non-combustible fiber cement |
| Typical warranty | Varies by finish; wood itself carries no manufacturer warranty against rot | Strong transferable manufacturer warranty on the product itself |
| Insect/rot vulnerability | Susceptible to wood-destroying insects and rot if maintenance lapses | Not susceptible to insect damage or wood rot |
Salt Air and Coastal Exposure
Even though Lynden is inland from the immediate shoreline, Whatcom County's proximity to the Salish Sea means salt-influenced air reaches further inland than people assume, especially with the prevailing weather patterns pushing moist marine air across the county. Salt exposure accelerates the breakdown of exposed finishes and can speed up the wear on wood surfaces that are already dealing with moisture cycling. It's one more variable stacked on top of rain and moss that pushes cedar's real-world maintenance burden higher than the sales pitch usually accounts for.
The Installation Sensitivity Issue
Cedar siding is also less forgiving of installation shortcuts than many homeowners realize. Proper back-priming (finishing the back and edges of boards, not just the face), correct fastener choice, adequate flashing at every penetration, and correct clearances from grade and roof lines all matter enormously with wood. Skip any of those details and a cedar installation that looks fine on day one can develop hidden moisture problems within a few years — problems that are expensive to diagnose and repair because they're happening behind the siding, not on the surface where you'd notice them early.
We're not willing to install a product where the margin for error is that thin, especially in a climate that already stacks the odds against wood siding longevity. That's a professional standard we hold ourselves to, not a claim about any specific brand or supplier of cedar products.
Why We Standardized on James Hardie Instead
After years of seeing how wood siding actually performs on homes in this climate versus how fiber cement performs, we made James Hardie our only siding product. A few reasons that decision holds up over time:
- Non-combustible material — a meaningful safety difference from any wood-based siding product.
- ColorPlus factory finish — baked-on color engineered to resist fading and hold up without a refinishing cycle, which matters when local weather makes DIY refinishing a hassle to schedule around.
- HZ5 product engineering — Hardie's HZ product lines are engineered for specific climate zones, including the wetter Pacific Northwest conditions we deal with here.
- Strong transferable warranty — meaningful manufacturer backing on the product itself, which matters if you sell the home before the siding's functional life is up.
- Proven long-term performance when installed to spec — fiber cement has a long track record in wet climates specifically because it doesn't share wood's moisture-cycling and organic-growth vulnerabilities.
We install one product because we believe in doing one thing well, to spec, every time — flashing details, fastener patterns, clearances, and joint treatment all done the way the manufacturer engineered the system to be installed. That consistency is a big part of why we don't split our attention across five different siding materials with five different failure modes.
What This Means If You're Comparing Options
If you're set on the cedar look, we'd rather be upfront that we're not the contractor for that project than take the job and cut corners on a material we don't stand behind long-term. If what you actually want is the low-maintenance, durable performance that made you consider siding replacement in the first place, that's exactly the conversation we're set up to have.
If you'd like to talk through what a fiber cement replacement would look like for your home — including options that echo a natural wood-grain appearance without the wood maintenance — we're happy to walk your property and give you a straightforward, no-pressure estimate.