WPC Decking for Italy — Laid Reversibly, on Buildings That Cannot Be Altered

Going Down Without Touching What Is Underneath

This is the part of the Italian market that a generic supplier page has nothing useful to say about. A terrace on a protected building, a centro storico apartment or a converted farmhouse has a constraint that outranks colour, price and everything else: whatever goes down has to be able to come back up.

Two ways to lay a deck that leaves no trace

Deck tiles — the photograph above — interlock with each other and rest on the existing floor. Nothing is bonded to the original surface, nothing is drilled into it, and the original tiles, stone or screed stay exactly as they are underneath. Look closely and you can see the square joints: it is a laid surface, not a fixed one.

Adjustable pedestals do the same thing at a larger scale, with the base plate sitting flat on the existing floor and the deck built above it. That route is covered in detail on the pedestal system page, including how the pedestals absorb an existing fall. Either way the deck is reversible: lift it and the original surface is still there.

What we can tell you, and what your architect decides

We can state plainly how the system is installed — no adhesive, no drilling, no anchors into the existing surface, and full removal without damage — and that is usually the question a direzione lavori is actually asking. Whether a particular intervention is permitted on a particular building is a question for your architect and the Soprintendenza, and that is properly their call, not a supplier's. What we do is give you an installation method that is straightforward to describe in the paperwork, and the technical documents to attach to it.

Why this also matters on an ordinary rental

The same property works in a much more common case: a terrace on a leased apartment or a commercial unit, where the tenant wants the space usable and the landlord wants the floor untouched. A reversible deck is the answer to both, and it is worth saying explicitly in the quotation — it takes an objection off the table before it is raised.

The Decking Range

Capped co-extrusion and classic uncapped, hollow and solid. Six of the sections ordered most often — the full schedule runs to well over a hundred.

Co-extrusion 23 × 138

Capped, hollow · 2.85 kg/m

The main capped section. This is the profile our slip test was run on.

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Co-extrusion 23 × 148

Capped, hollow, premium

Wider capped board, four-sided cap. The usual choice for terraces in full sun.

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Co-extrusion solid 20 × 140

Capped, solid core

Solid throughout. Specified for commercial traffic and exposed edges.

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3D embossed, round chamber

Deep-grain surface

Heavier embossing than a standard woodgrain, in the capped construction.

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3D embossed, square chamber

Deep-grain surface

Same surface, square-cell core. Lower cost per square metre than the round-chamber section.

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Classic 140 × 25

Uncapped, square chamber

First-generation grade, shown in Walnut. Cost-led work with routine cleaning.

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What the Board Is Made Of, and What the Surface Does

Straight from our own catalogue, with nothing rounded up.

60% wood powder, 30% HDPE, 10% additives

That is the whole recipe, and we would rather publish the additive share than print two numbers that do not add up to a hundred. On the capped range a co-extruded shield wraps a WPC core, and the shield is the wearing layer — it is what carries the fade and scratch resistance. The material can be recycled and reused at end of life.

The gaps are part of the drainage, not a tolerance

The gap between boards is a working part of the assembly: it lets the board move with temperature, and it lets water off the surface to whatever is below. On a reversible deck over an existing floor that matters twice over — the original surface keeps draining as it always did, and water is not trapped between the two. Keep the gaps clear and the deck stays a deck rather than a tray.

Sections and textures

ZSGJ138H23A and ZSGJ138H23C at 138 × 23 mm, ZSGJ138H25 at 138 × 25, ZSGJ140S23 at 140 × 23, ZSGJ140S25 at 140 × 25, ZSGJ145S30 at 145 × 30. Capped surfaces run H1 straight grain and H2, H3 and H5 wood grain; the classic range uses its own set of codes, so quote the texture together with the range. The full schedule with metre weights is on the model page.

Colours — Three Ranges

Colour and texture are specified separately from the profile, so a complete specification is three things: model, texture code, colour.

The full colour card

Capped co-extrusion: Teak, Antique, Redwood, IPE, Light-grey, Walnut.
Classic uncapped: Teak, Redwood, Walnut, Coffee, Chocolate, Ebony.
3D embossing: Teak, Red Wood, Walnut, Chocolate, Light Grey, Dark Grey.

Where the greys live, and why colour is a comfort decision in the south

Grey is available in the capped co-extrusion range (Antique, Light-grey) and in the 3D embossing range (Light Grey, Dark Grey). So a grey brief is a capped or 3D embossed job and should be priced on that basis from the first conversation. South of Rome, colour is also about surface temperature: a dark board in full summer sun gets genuinely hot underfoot — true of every composite, and of stone and porcelain too. Where a terrace is crossed barefoot, start at the lighter end.

Two things worth settling before you order

A swatch is an indication, not a match — ask for physical samples in the two or three you have shortlisted, free, with the courier credited against your first order. And order the whole job in one batch: pigment goes into the extrusion, so two runs of the same colour will not be identical and a board replaced in year four will not match. On a hotel or agriturismo refurbishment phased over two seasons, say so at the quotation stage so the whole quantity is run together.

Where It Goes in Italy

Three project types that carry most of the volume, each with a different question attached.

Terraces on existing buildings

Apartment terraces, lastrici solari, converted farmhouses. The constraint is almost always the same — the existing floor stays, the new surface is laid over it, and the height available under the door threshold decides everything. Measure that height first and tell us the figure; it determines whether the job is tiles, a low pedestal build-up or neither.

Agriturismi and small hotels

This is a market structure Italy has more of than anywhere else we sell: a great many small accommodation businesses doing 60 to 300 m² at a time, usually out of season, usually with the owner making the decision. Our 70 m² minimum exists for exactly this order size — a single terrace, quoted properly, without being told to buy a container.

Public and landscape work

Lungomare walkways, park boardwalks, lakeside paths. Here the questions change: traffic, batch consistency across a large area, and a documented supply chain for a public tender. Solid sections get specified for the trafficked runs. Tell us it is a tender at the enquiry stage and we will put the certification pack together with the quotation rather than after you have asked twice.

Installation and Accessories

From our own installation guide. Put these figures on the drawing before the frame goes down — most of the failures we see in Europe come from a frame set out to timber habits.

The gaps, and the double joist

5–7 mm between the sides of adjacent boards. About 5 mm between a capped board and a wall. 3–5 mm at butt joints where two board ends meet. Butt joints sit on double joists — each board end gets its own joist, never a shared one, and this is the detail most often missed. Set a gutter at the base so water drains rather than ponds.

Accessories, with sizes

Stainless steel start clip, plastic clip, expansion screw, L-shaped corner trim 50 × 50 × 3000 mm, WPC joist 40 × 30 × 3000 mm, aluminium joist 40 × 25 × 2900 mm. Note the aluminium joist is 2900 mm, not 3000 — an easy hundred millimetres to lose when you take off quantities. On the coast, specify A4 / 316 stainless for the clips and fixings rather than A2.

Ask About a Specific Profile

Send the section, the area and the threshold height

What Owning the Line Gives You

Capacity you can book against

Roughly 2,000 tonnes a month, about 100 containers. What matters to a distributor is not the headline but that a repeat order does not queue behind somebody else's. Send the volume and the date; we answer with a slot, not a hope.

Dies are ours, so sections are ours

We own the moulds and cut them in-house. That is why the schedule runs past a hundred sections rather than a catalogue page — and why we can talk seriously about a market-specific profile.

A test report with every shipment

Goods are checked before despatch and the report travels with them. Routine, not negotiated — and on a public tender it is the difference between answering a documentation query in an hour and answering it in a fortnight.

Certification: What We Hold, and the Exact Scope

Italian specifiers and direzione lavori verify, so here is the whole picture including the exact scope — a certificate covering three profiles covers those three profiles. Ask and we send the document itself.

Get the Documents Themselves

Nothing above is a claim you have to take on trust. Tell us which documents your project needs and we will send the PDFs — certificate, Declaration of Performance with the reaction-to-fire class, the laboratory reports and the warranty schedule.

Request the certificates and test reports

What We Do for a Distributor

A first order can be well under a container

Minimum order is 70 m². That is roughly one agriturismo terrace, which is deliberate — a new distributor can test a colour, a profile and our paperwork before committing to a 40HQ. Most suppliers at this end of the market quote 1 × FCL and lose the first conversation.

Samples are free

You pay the courier and we credit it in full against your first order. Ask for a sawn sample: the cut end shows whether the cap runs all the way round the section or stops at the sides. Ask for a light colour and a dark one and leave them in the sun for an afternoon before deciding.

A real number within 24 hours

Send the specification and the volume, get a per-unit price rather than a range. We need: profile, colour, quantity in m², discharge port, the height available under the threshold, and the date it has to be on the ground.

Private label, market-specific sections, testing on your profile

All three are conversations. We own the tooling, we already run sections cut for particular export markets, and where a project needs a test our documents do not cover we will put your profile through the laboratory — fee up front, credited against the order. Every result we send you names the profile it was measured on.

Italy: Route, Transit and Terms

Loading is Nansha or Yantian, both in Guangdong, both within trucking distance of the plant. Italy has more useful discharge options than most European markets, and one of them is not really about Italy at all.

Italy Is Two Climates and a Mountain Range

Milan and Palermo are further apart in climate than most pairs of European capitals. This section is deliberately shorter than the reversibility section above, because in this market the building usually constrains the job more than the weather does — but the weather still decides a few things.

The Po valley: damp, fog and a real winter

Milan, Turin, Bologna and the whole plain behave far more like our German and Polish markets than like the coast. Winter is damp and often sunless for weeks, which is when a north-facing terrace grows a green film — algae on a surface that never dries. It sits on the surface rather than in the material, so it washes off, but it appears sooner than clients expect. Fall, clear board gaps and a wash twice a year handle it. The annual temperature swing here is also wide enough that the end gap is not optional.

The south and the islands: sun and surface temperature

Sicily, Puglia, Calabria and coastal Campania are closer to our Spanish market. UV exposure is cumulative and the capped shield is the layer that carries it, which is the argument for the capped grade on a fully exposed southern terrace. Surface temperature is a colour decision — specify from the lighter end where people are barefoot, and where there is a pergola over the terrace, say so, because shade changes the problem more than the product choice does.

The Alps, the Dolomites and the Apennines

Mountain projects add snow, and snow load is a structural question for whoever designs the substructure, not a board question — give them the metre weight for your profile and let them do the arithmetic. Two practical points for the installer: clear snow with a plastic blade rather than a steel-edged one, because a steel edge dragged across the surface scratches the shield; and where boards are laid on a cold morning, work to the upper end of the gap range.

The coast: salt attacks the fixings, not the boards

Italy has a very long coastline and most of the market sits near it. The composite handles salt air. Screws, clips, joist hangers and post bases do not — and that is exactly where nobody looks until the deck has to come up. Specify A4 / 316 stainless rather than A2 and put the grade in the quotation.

Near Water, Read the Slip Number Properly

Pools, lungomare walkways and lakeside decks all raise the same question, and the useful answer is about method rather than adjectives.

What our result is

R10 under AS 4586-2013 Appendix D, ramp method at 15 degrees, Intertek report 230625005SHF-001, measured on profile ZSGJ138H23A. That is the shod wet method — the number that describes a surface walked in shoes. It belongs to that profile and that method, and we will send the report so your own technician reads the scope on its face.

Barefoot wet areas use a different method and a different scale

A figure from one method does not convert into the other. Establish which one your project, your client's insurer or the direzione lavori is actually asking for, then ask us for the report that matches. Bring us the requirement and we answer it with a document. And on any project involving treated water, ask for the warranty schedule before you quote rather than after — it is a two-minute read that settles a year-three conversation.

Three Things That Go Wrong When Europeans Import WPC

Not sales copy — these are the three that cost distributors money.

The frame is set out for timber

A joiner spaces joists at whatever timber decking takes, because that is the habit. Composite has a maximum support spacing and it is tighter than timber. Get the figure for your profile in writing and put it on the drawing before the frame goes down. Wrong, and the deck does not collapse — it flexes underfoot permanently, and the fix is lifting the boards.

The end gap gets left out

The most expensive of the three, because a buckled deck is a full relay with no partial fix. The figures are in the installation section above — and the double joist under a butt joint is the half of it people forget.

Batch colour is not matched later

Pigment goes into the extrusion, so two runs of the same colour will not be identical. Order the whole job in one batch and keep spares from it. A board replaced in year four will not match — ours or anybody else's. On a hotel refurbishment phased across two closed seasons, say so at quotation stage so the phases are run as one job.

Warranty, and How a Claim Works

Stepped, not flat

Capped co-extrusion carries 15 years, classic uncapped 10. Both step down by year rather than paying full value throughout: 100% of the value of the affected goods in years 1–3, then 80, 70, 50 and 40% through years 4 to 7, then reducing in bands to 10% in the final years. It covers peeling, cracking and overall uneven fading.

It starts at the destination port

Cover runs from the date the goods arrive and are signed for at the port — not our factory gate, and not the day your customer installs them. That usually works in the distributor's favour.

Certificates are per batch

The schedule that applies is the one on that batch's certificate, which is why the test report shipping with the goods matters. Keep it with the commercial paperwork. If a supplier quotes you a flat 25 years, ask for the schedule — the answer tells you more than the number.

Talk to Us About Italy

The full enquiry, if you would rather send everything at once. Tell us if the building is protected or the existing floor has to stay untouched — it changes the whole build-up. You will hear back within 24 hours with a real per-unit price.

Distributor and project enquiry

Italy: Common Questions