Decorating a terrace becomes a hot topic every spring, as the increasing light and warmth gets interior designers excited about outdoor spaces. The terrace is increasingly seen as a way to extend the living space of the home closer to nature, and is often updated to match the style of the rest of the home's interior.

What kind of terrace is best for your home and your interior design style? You can also find inspiration in our interior trends report.

Start decorating your terrace by identifying the features of your dream terrace

Do you need a space for relaxation, home exercises, children's play or especially for summer outdoor dining? As with all interior design, patio design starts with your or your family's needs and preferences.

Finland's four seasons make the active use of your terrace limited, but fortunately, with heat lamps, view barriers and covered areas, you can enjoy your patio from early spring until late autumn if you wish.

In line with broader interior design trends, the popularity of ecological and atmospheric wood furnishings is also becoming increasingly evident in terrace furnishings. In this article you will find, above all, ideas on how to make the most of wood on your terrace.

However, the first thing to consider when designing a terrace is the need for screens and the choice of materials, as these create the majority of the atmosphere. Read our 5 tips for using wood to decorate your terrace!

1. Obstacles to vision and space dividers from lattice baffles

For many people planning to decorate a terrace, the first step is to build view barriers and partitions or to update old and worn wooden parts.

Is there a car or footpath running past your yard, or is your neighbour's house so close that you can read the headlines of the newspaper in your hand through their window? If so, a visual barrier is probably an important factor in the peaceful atmosphere of your patio.

A wooden screen does not have to mean a high, solid wall that obscures the entire terrace. Vertically or horizontally positioned according to the style of your house, they create an airy, 2020s-style screen. The screen provides partial shade from direct sunlight, but also allows you to relax on the terrace without being overlooked.

And is there an outdoor pool or a lot connected to your terrace? It can sometimes be justified to divide a larger patio space into, for example, dining and bathing areas, with the use of lattice trellis screens to create a beautifully rhythmical visual barrier.

Discover our rim options:

Orientation laths: lath 28×68 mm and lath 40×42 mm

Vinorimat: lath 28×45/30 mm and lath 42×42/32 mm

2. More solid fences provide security

If your terrace is not at ground level, sturdy fencing around it is of course a necessity. In addition, for example, a terrace on a sloping plot with several levels required railings around the stairs. Wooden fences can withstand years of varying weather conditions, but durability depends on the right choice of materials and construction techniques.

When building a fence, the first considerations are the height and design of the fence. A high fence provides good screening, but may shade too effectively. As with trellis fences, fence boards can be mounted vertically or horizontally, but also diagonally. The diagonal method is a sure eye-catcher, but is by far the most labour-intensive and time-consuming solution to build.

When fixing the fence boards, you must also remember to ensure that air can pass between the boards well. If you make the fence too tight, the whole structure could be blown over by strong winds. In this context, it is also worth noting that the frame posts that are to be fixed to the ground should be dug sufficiently deep into the ground. As a rule of thumb, digging below the frost line is a good way of preventing the soil from fouling the fence frame.

A thick garden board lasts longer than a thin one. The most common thickness is 20 mm, while the width can be 95 mm, 120 mm or 145 mm. With different widths of material, you can create a different feel. It is essential to use stainless steel screws when fixing fence boards.

See more information about our fence boards "

You can also easily combine your fence with a pre-painted balustrade to speed up your work and finish the look of your fence.

3. Beautifully greying, natural larch

If you want your terrace to feel as natural as possible, choose larch as the main material. Not only does real wood feel great underfoot, it's also the most ecological choice for decking. Ecology is definitely a rising trend, so decorating your terrace with larch is an eco-friendly choice and definitely in tune with the times.

Larch is also a better material for yard construction than pine, because spruce absorbs much less moisture and therefore has less moisture absorption. Our long, cold winters make spruce a strong and delicate building material, resistant to decay and easy to care for as a natural product.

A characteristic feature of deciduous spruce is that the wood turns grey in two to three years, but you can of course oil it with an untinted oil or alternatively tint it to your preferred shade. However, when building, it is important to remember that larch should not come into direct contact with the ground. Properly installed out of the ground, the larch will last for about 20-30 years without decaying.

We manufacture fence boards and laths made of deciduous spruce from the heartwood of spruce trees, sawn around the circumference.

4. Layering your terrace: combining wood with other materials

Add depth and layers to your terrace by combining wood with other materials. Wooden decking details in themselves are a good match for wood cladding, stone or brick houses. In particular, stone houses often need a softening element of wood in their façade.

You can bring in green plants and flowers, for example, according to your preferences - trellis is also a good support for climbing plants. In addition to the beauty of the plants, you can combine decorating your terrace with growing useful plants, as a variety of herbs and berries, or even larger planter boxes with vegetables, will give your terrace a personal touch.

You can also soften the atmosphere of your terrace with textiles. Carpets, sun loungers, frames, decorative cushions and hammocks offer plenty of choice for decorating your terrace.

What about terrace lighting? Lighting is a great way to highlight the best aspects of your terrace and create a mood for darkening evenings. In the bright spring sunshine, you might not even think about lighting when you're planning your terrace, but the late, warm evenings of late August call for soft light on the terrace too.

5. Quick builder gets a finished look with easy pre-painted material

Painting woodwork is traditionally seen as a laborious job, and no wonder, since painting large quantities of wood is a chore when the weather changes! At Siparila, we have done our part to alleviate the time-consumption problem for builders and decorators by painting the timber materials for yard construction for you.

Now using pre-painted wooden trim strips is easy: just place the pre-painted strips in place, paint the fixing marks and any cut-off points, and you're done. However, it is still very important to surface treat the fixing marks to prevent water and contaminants from damaging the wood. Moisture absorption into the wood can cause, among other things, cracking of the paint surface.

The most convenient way to attach the battens is to use a staple gun, nailing or screwing them in place to ensure that they are symmetrically spaced equidistant from each other. A template can be, for example, a piece of sawn board. Of course, you can also measure the positions of the battens and mark them on the frame stake before you start fixing.

Wooden mouldings are available in standard colours white (S-0502-Y), grey (RR23), light brown (1805) and on request in the shades of the exterior colour charts.

You can also buy the fence boards and matching railing boards pre-painted, so all you have to do after fixing is paint the fixing marks to hide them. Industrial indoor painting is always of high quality and takes into account the protection of the fence board against blue staining and damaging UV rays.

However, when building with wood, it is always important to ensure that water does not remain standing on wooden surfaces. Rainwater and snowmelt water must therefore run off the posts and fence boards and down to the ground. It is also important to apply a generous coat of paint to all fixing and breaking points where the paint surface has broken down.

It's a good idea to start decorating your patio in spring, so you can make the most of the sunny summer days!