Colorbond Roof Colours - A Guide to Choosing Colours

When it comes to building or renovating a house, the area that most people focus on the least is no other than the roof. After all, you don’t have to deal with this part of your home daily, right?

Contrary to popular belief, your roofing matters—a lot. Keep in mind that it is your roof that will protect you, your family, and your belongings from the wind, dust, rain, thunder, lightning, and whatever else Mother Nature will throw at your home.

One of the best roofing brands in the market is Colorbond®. The colours of Colorbond® have been licensed to paint manufacturers like Dulux. Moreover, all the Colorbond roof colour options are not just for new metal roofs. These can also be used in repainting old Colorbond or tin roofs and concrete tile roofs.

When choosing Colorbond roofs, you will be faced with lots of colour options. You will be tempted to choose any shade available. Don’t. You need to select the right Colorbond roof colour for your home.

If the roof colour that you choose does not match the colour or architectural design of your home, the curb value of your property could depreciate. If the colour of your home does not follow the colour restrictions of your neighbourhood, you could even be required to pay fines and penalties.

So you see, there’s a lot at stake when it comes to choosing the right Colorbond roof colour for your home. Don’t worry, though. We got your back! In this article, we will talk about everything you need to know to choose the perfect Colorbond roof colour for your needs.

Why Your Roof Colour Matters

Why would you need to take the time to choose the right colour for your roof? Here are some of the reasons you need to be aware of:

The right roof colour can affect the curb appeal of your home.

You might not believe it, but your roof accounts up to 40% of your home’s exterior appearance. Keep in mind that it is the outer part of your home that will first be seen and noticed by potential buyers or guests.

If you want to wow them or increase the resale value of your home, it is essential to ensure that you choose a roof colour that will perfectly match your home’s architectural style and colour.

Related: Does a Roof Restoration Improve House Value?

Colours can affect how you feel.

It is a universal fact that colour can affect how someone feels. It can help you feel calm, relaxed, happy, excited, and more. And since it is your roof that will first greet you when you come home, you have to make sure that you choose a colour that invites the right emotions.

The colour of your roof affects the temperature inside your home.

This doesn’t get talked about a lot, but it is true. The hue that you choose for your roof can either increase or decrease the temperature inside your home because of the way it reacts to sunlight. How can this simple fact affect you? Well, any change in internal temperature can have an impact on your electric bill.

Which colours make your home hotter and which can make it feel cooler? We will explore that in detail in the next few sections.

What are the Most Popular Colorbond® Roof Colours?

The colours of Colorbond roofs are categorized into three different groups—contemporary colours, classic colours, and matt colours.

To know more about these colour categories, here are the Colorbond colour options that fall under these categories:

Contemporary Colours

Basalt
Dune
Evening Haze
Gully
Ironstone
Jasper
Monument
Shale Grey
Surfmist
Wallaby
Windspray

Classic Colours

Classic Cream
Cottage Green
Deep Ocean
Manor Red
Pale Eucalypt
Night Sky
Woodland Grey
Paperbark

Matt Colours

Dune
Monument
Basalt
Surfmist
Shale Grey

Vivify Tip: As a reputable provider of Roof Restoration Melbourne services for many years, among our customers the most popular colour choices are: Monument, Basalt & Shale Grey.

New 2022 COLORBOND® Colour Range

In August of 2022, COLORBOND® added three new roof colours to their palette following several rounds of rigorous market research. These new finishes are a testament to the company’s commitment to stay abreast of the latest styles and trends.

Dover White is a bright, versatile white that can be used to provide much needed contrast to dark shades. Or, in a colour scheme of many similar tones, Dover White serves well to balance the palette and hold all the colours together.

Not only is it suitable for gutters, garage doors, walling, and fascia, but Dover White is also an ideal choice if you need a roof that keeps your home cool in the summer. With a solar absorptance rating of 0.28 and a solar reflectance index of 88, Dover White provides some of the best possible roof heat resistance on the market.

Southerly features lively yet relaxed grey tones that are inspired by scenes of far off hills and distant coasts. If a cool breeze blowing in from the sea had a colour, it would be Southerly. It is a shade that serves well for roofs that accent timber, brick or concrete—breathing new life into any or all of these materials.

Bluegum is a darker grey than Southerly, reminiscent of the gum trees that inspire the name and the thick mist that rises from the mountains they grow atop. As a mid tone, it has a lot of versatility—at home equally in urban or rural settings. Bluegum is best used to compliment dark timbers or natural stone finishes. As a roofing colour, it serves to create a sleek, modern style.

Understanding the Difference in Temperature and Cooling Properties of Roof Colours

As mentioned previously, your roof colour is more than just for aesthetics. The colour of the roof that you choose can also significantly affect the internal temperature in your home.

But how can it do that? And how can you choose the right roof colour to help you achieve the right temperature for your home? To help you out, we will explain the differences in temperature and cooling properties of roof colours.

A roof colour either reflects or absorbs heat. In general, lighter-coloured roofs are the ones that reflect the rays of the sun. This means that they can keep the internal temperature of your home colder just by a few degrees. Because of this, your air conditioning system will operate more efficiently. When it is at its maximum efficiency, it will use less power, driving down your electricity bills.

On the other hand, dark-coloured roofs absorb heat and may raise the temperature inside your home by a few degrees. As a result, the cooling system would work harder to compensate for the extra heat, which will cause your electricity bills to rise.

But during the winter season, the effects of the roof colour on your electricity bills will be the opposite. Since the dark roof keeps the internal temperature a bit higher, your heating system won’t have to work as hard, and so, you can expect your electric bill to be not as high.

Aside from the internal temperature, another concern that homeowners have during the winter season is the snowmelt. Based on the information mentioned, darker roofs tend to feel hotter because it absorbs sunlight which will cause the snow to melt a lot faster. That makes sense, right?

Tips for Choosing the Colorbond Roof Colour

In addition to considering how the roof colour can affect the internal temperature of your home, there are a few other things that you need to keep in mind to make the right choice.

Location of Your House

As mentioned, the location of your house should be considered when choosing a Colorbond roof colour. But there is more to it than that.

What you should understand is the characteristic of sunlight may vary from one region to another. The northern sunlight has a cool bluish shade to it while the southern sunshine is a bit warmer and more reddish. Because of this, the look of the roof colour in the North may not be the same when you are in the South. For cities in the South, you can go for roof colour in the brown, red, and orange arena. Homes in the northern cities would benefit from bluish to greyish shades.

Architectural Style of Your Home

Never choose a colour that matches your home’s architectural style. Because if you do that, your house will look monotonous, bland, and boring. Instead, choose a colour that will complement it.

For example, historical homes would look great with dark grey, black, dark green, or blue. On the other hand, a Victorian home would look best with shades of brown. Houses made of log or wood would benefit from a contrasting grey roof colour.

Permanent Fixtures

Aside from the style of your home, your house probably has a few design accents that are there to stay. These may be made of wood, brick, cement, and many other materials. If that’s the case, you should also make sure that your roof colour will look good with them.

If your home has brick accents, try a brown roof colour. For homes with fibre cement siding, try green, blue, or red roof colours. If your home has logs or wood designs, try choosing from black, grey, brown, or green.

Colour of Your House

Aside from the architectural style of your house, you also need to consider the colour of your home. Here are some guidelines that you can follow:

If the colour of your house has beige to cream shade, the best roof colours to go for are black, brown, grey, and blue.
If your house is coloured brown, you can choose from black, green, brown, and grey roof colours.
If you have a white house, you are lucky because any roof colour can go well with it.

Keep in mind that these guidelines are only applicable if the mentioned colours won’t clash with any permanent exterior fixtures in your home.

Colour of Siding and Trim

If you are planning to stick with the colour of your siding and only repaint the colour of your roof, you need to make sure that the roof colour you choose will go perfectly well with your current siding and trim colour.

Again, many homeowners may be tempted to choose a roof colour that is similar to the colour of their siding or trim. That is a big no-no as this can make your house look boring.

If you want to improve your curb appeal, try this simple trick: choose a roof colour that is two to three shades darker than the colour of your siding and trim. For example, you can go for a dark brown colour if your siding or trim colour is tan.

Personal Preference

As you may have noticed, we do not limit our recommendations to just one colour. There are more than two colour suggestions when we give examples. That’s because we believe that it is your home. It is the expression of who you are. This means that you should use these factors only as your guideline. In the end, you should choose the roof colour that speaks to you the most.

HOA restrictions

Are you living in a subdivision that is governed by either a Homeowner’s Association or Architectural Review Committee? If yes, then your roof colour options may be limited. Most of these associations have pre-determined colour selections that you should stick to.

Because of this, you must check the regulations and guidelines first before you start painting your roof. This is important because you may incur penalties and fees if you don’t stick to the rules that the subdivision has.

Tips for Choosing the Right Colorbond Roof Colour

Aside from the factors to consider that we’ve just outlined, here are a few roof colour choosing tips that you should keep in mind:

Test swatches at different times of the day.

Using the factors mentioned, you will be able to narrow down your choices. If you haven’t already, try to obtain swatches from the paint manufacturer. After that, check out what the colour looks like at different times of the day. You can do this by placing the swatches against your siding or on your window sill.

You see, the sunlight in different times of day may make some shades look different. That’s why you should test them and see what they look like.

Make your house look bigger.

Another way that the roof colour can affect the look of your house is it can make it look bigger. However, you’ll only get this benefit if you choose the right roof colour.

Roofs with lighter shades can make a house look bigger. Additionally, these colours can draw attention to any positive features your home may have. That’s why these are your best options if you want to improve your curb appeal. On the other hand, darker shades can hide your house’s imperfections.

Colorbond Roof Colours - A Guide to Choosing Colours | Melbourne (7)

Use online tools.

If you want to see how the roof colours you have chosen will look on your house, try using online tools that will let you choose from different siding, trim, and roof colours and overlay them on photos of your home.

Refer to the colour wheel.

If you like to go old school, then nothing will work better than this oldie but goodie: the colour wheel. This tool can help you decide which colour would look best in your roof in just a few seconds. But of course, you have to remember the principles of the colour wheel that your art teacher taught you years ago. These include the principles of complementary colours, analogous colours, and triad colours.

If you don’t remember these, don’t worry. A simple Google search can do the trick!

Get help from a professional.

Sometimes, the best bet is to seek the help of an expert. If you think you can’t choose your roof colour on your own, try to consult a roof painting expert that can work with you in building the roof of your dreams. With their experience and in-depth knowledge about the roof, you can never go wrong with their help.

In Summary

With all the essential information you have to consider, and the number of roof colour options you can choose from, choosing the right roof colour for your home can be overwhelming and confusing.

The scariest part is, choosing the wrong roof colour may cost you a lot. If you want to make sure that you choose the right colour for your roof, it is best to play it safe and seek the assistance of paint experts.

A roof specialist can help evaluate your roof and home to determine which colour will best suit your needs. More than that, they can expertly assess your roof condition and identify if there are areas that need to be repaired before painting. With a roofing expert as your partner, you are assured that all your roofing needs are in safe hands.

For a hassle-free and quality Colorbond roofing installation, replacement or repaint experience, call Vivify Roofing at 1300 475 097 or request a quote online today. Our team is waiting to help you find the roof colour of your dreams.

Colorbond Roof Colours - A Guide to Choosing Colours | Melbourne (2024)