Ornamental copper roofing is the gold standard for architectural excellence, cherished for its long-lasting strength, flexibility, and beautiful appearance. A copper roof showcases superior craftsmanship and fine detailing while protecting your property’s value. At Stevens Roofing Corp, we are Virginia’s leading ornamental copper roofing contractor and historic roof restoration experts.
What Is Ornamental Roofing?
Ornamental roofing adds beautiful decorative elements that look stunning while serving as functional parts of your roof. These enhance a building’s appearance and often reflect a specific architectural style, historical era, or cultural, religious, or regional influence. The construction or preservation of ornamental roofing remains essential in traditional designs and restoration projects, enhancing a building’s visual appeal and interest.
The Importance Of Ornamental Roofing
Preserving historic buildings lets us experience and appreciate the architecture of the past. When a society loses connections to previous generations, it no longer has an accurate perspective of how its cultural, historical, religious, or geographical heritage shaped its present existence. Ornamental roofing tells an aesthetically pleasing visual story worth remembering.
Copper On Roofs: A Brief Review
Copper roofing dates back over 2,000 years. Ancient Romans utilized copper sheets on the Pantheon’s dome. Medieval Europeans routinely used copper for cathedral and church roofs across the continent. Early colonial settlers furthered this practice by producing copper sheets for roofing government buildings and churches. The Industrial Revolution improved manufacturing techniques to make copper more readily available in the late 1700s and early 1800s.
Today, copper continues to play a vital role in roofing significant commercial and residential buildings. Because a modern copper roof will last over 100-200 years with minimal maintenance, it provides an ideal solution for a long-term investment. The natural patination process, wherein copper transitions from its original salmon color to brown to blue-green, remains one of its most distinctive features. Copper is also 100% recyclable and highly energy efficient.
Copper Is Highly Flexible & Ductile
For creating, preserving, or modifying a historic roof, the outer roofing material must be malleable, which allows the roofing professional to hammer or press the surface layer without breaking or cracking it. Malleability also enables design flexibility and customization. More roofing contractors prefer copper when constructing or remodeling historical buildings.
Due to copper’s extreme malleability, a skilled professional can more easily develop intricate, delicate elements such as cupolas, finials, and weathervanes for geometrically challenging roofs. In practice, copper can be easily hammered, soldered, welded, mechanically joined, shaped, and formed into complex or custom designs to deliver impressive results while preserving its historical quality and style.
Copper Delivers Ornamental Roofing Elements
Because of copper’s unique elemental properties, roofing professionals can forge ornate elements to enhance a building’s distinctive appearance. These features may include the following:
- Cresting: Decorative architectural trim running along a roof’s ridge.
- Cupola: A unique tower or dome-like structure adorning a roof.
- Decorative roofing: A patterned arrangement of tiles or shingles.
- Dormer: A visually appealing window projecting from a sloped roof.
- Finial: A distinctive ornament or spire at the roof’s apex or gable.
- Ornamental chimney: A chimney with decorative brickwork or cap.
- Turret: A small tower projecting from the roof or wall of a building.
- Weathervane: A functional decoration rotating to show wind direction.
Ornamental Copper Roof: Value Enhancement
The distinctive appearance and long lifespan of ornamental copper work will preserve or meaningfully enhance a property’s overall value. Ornamental copper roofing remains in high demand among discerning property and home buyers. They recognize that copper lasts 3 to 10 times longer than many other popular roofing materials, including asphalt shingles, wood shakes, and aluminum or steel panels.
Ornamental copper roofing virtually eliminates replacement costs throughout a building’s lifespan, as the roof can outlast the building’s useful life. Because this roofing option does not require repainting, resealing, or treatment, it offers an ideal low-to-no-maintenance solution. Its durability and longevity may reduce insurance premiums by providing optimal wind and fire resistance.
At the end of its service life, ornamental copper roofing customarily retains significant scrap value. Experts estimate that it keeps approximately 90% of the value compared to new copper. In other words, “used” copper roofing does not significantly depreciate. By comparison, most conventional roofing materials have zero or even negative salvage value due to disposal costs and non-renewability or recyclability.
Working With The #1 Ornamental Copper Roofer
For over 70 years, Stevens Roofing Corp has delivered unparalleled ornamental copper roofing services for residents across Virginia, including Norfolk and Richmond. We are this region’s most experienced and knowledgeable historic roof restoration company. We use rare, traditional methods and materials that others have forgotten. Our expertise ensures your historic roof receives expert craftsmanship to restore and protect it.
Contact Stevens Roofing Corp today to learn more about our roofing services or to schedule an appointment.
