Radical Roofing is on the Rise

Here at D-marc we take a special interest in the roofing industry – after all, we’re in the business of making roofing work safer with our work at height protection solutions like our D-walk™ Roof Walker systems which provides a designated anti-slip raised walkway on flat roofs.  We’re always on the lookout for news and new information that’s relevant to the roofing industry and while we’re scouring the internet and following links, we come across some pretty weird and wonderful stuff at times.  We’ve decided to publish a regular Radical Roofing article so that we can share some of the funny, interesting and downright mad stories with our readers as a little light-hearted break from the serious business of staying safe on roofs.

We’ve been discovering that creative DIY-ers are turning to all sorts of different materials to use as roofing – some in a bid to be more eco-friendly and environmentally conscious, some to save money and some just in order to stand out from the crowd with their whacky ideas!  For instance, we’ve come across a roof made from old LP records used as overlapping shingles.  Nashville based musician, Matt Glassmeyer has made a roof from his porch using 350 damaged vinyl records in an overlapping pattern.  Each record is held in place with a single nail and washer through the centre.

Next we came across some merry DIY-ers who make shingles (and sidings) out of aluminium beer cans – we kid you not, here folks.  They use tin snips, or even scissors, to cut off the ends of the cans and then flatten them out into rectangles which are pressed with a die made from hardwood and metal rods in order to put ridges into the shingles which are then used to cover the roof.  Admittedly, the roof is on a chicken shack, but we see so many corrugated tin roofs, that it’s no wonder people are finding ways to spend their money on beer rather than roof tiles and killing two birds with one stone, so to speak.

Other people have used the circular ends of food cans to make some pretty cool round, overlapping shingles to decorate their roofs with, while large scallop shells have also featured heavily in what we found online.  Not to be outdone by the musician some crafty people have used old CDs as shingles – after all, vinyl is soooo old-school and CDs do sparkle prettily in the sun.

We’ve come across thatched roofs, several different types of green roof and even roofs covered with shingles made out of tyres.  Perhaps it’s not a surprise that used tyres are being put to all different types of uses, upcycling them into planters, toys, garden décor, even sofas – after all, the planet has millions of them and disposing of them by burning damages the environment in a big bad way.  We’ve seen antique wood shingles on houses around the world, roof shingles made from plastic water bottles and a shed roof made from an upturned boat.  One of the most colourful roofs we came across was made entirely from overlapping discarded flip-flops!