Full Cedar Shake Roof Replacement on a Duluth Property

Cedar shake is one of those roofing materials that looks incredible when it's new - and tells a pretty clear story when it's had enough. This property had aged shake that had gone dark and brittle from years of Minnesota winters. The look was tired. More importantly, it wasn't doing the job it needed to do anymore.

Here's what we were working with: multiple structures on the same property, all wearing the same worn-out shake. That meant stripping everything down to clean decking across the main house and the outbuildings, then starting fresh. You can see the bare sheathing exposed mid-job - that's the moment where everything gets checked before a single new shingle goes down.

New cedar shake is something else entirely. The color is warm, the grain is tight, and when it's installed right, the coursing lines are clean and consistent all the way across the roof. That's what separates a good cedar shake installation from a rough one - the details in how each course is laid and how the edges are finished.

Cedar shake is a natural material, which means it breathes differently than asphalt and handles freeze-thaw cycles well when it's installed with proper spacing and underlayment. For homes in the Duluth area, that matters. The climate here puts roofs through a lot, and cedar - done right - holds up well season after season.

This was a big scope of work across a property with a lot of character. Getting the old material off, prepping the deck, and laying fresh shake across multiple rooflines is the kind of residential roofing project we take a lot of pride in. The end result speaks for itself.