Anacortes Siding Two Engineered Sidings, One Skagit County Climate
If you're replacing siding in Anacortes, you've probably run into two products marketed as the "modern" alternative to cedar: James Hardie fiber cement and LP SmartSide engineered wood. Both are legitimate step-ups from vinyl. Both come from established manufacturers with real warranties. But they are built from fundamentally different materials, and that difference matters a lot once you factor in salt air off Fidalgo Bay, driving winter rain, and the long, damp moss season that Skagit County homes deal with every year.
This page lays out how the two products actually compare, not just on the spec sheet, but on the trade-offs we see matter most for homes in this specific climate.
What LP SmartSide Is — and What It Gets Right
LP SmartSide is an engineered wood product: strand board made from wood fibers, resins, and zinc borate for insect resistance, pressed into panels or lap siding and coated with a primer. It's lighter than fiber cement, easier for crews to cut and nail without special blades, and generally less expensive up front. For dry climates or homes with generous roof overhangs and good site drainage, it can perform reasonably well over its service life.
LP has also improved the product over the years, and the company backs it with a substantial limited warranty. We're not going to tell you it's a bad product in the abstract — it's a fair, honest option that a lot of contractors install with good results.
Where Wood-Based Siding Runs Into Trouble Here
The core issue isn't manufacturing quality — it's material chemistry. LP SmartSide is still wood at its core. Wood fiber, resin-bound or not, absorbs and releases moisture. In a climate with occasional dry summer stretches, that's manageable. In Anacortes, where fall through spring brings sustained rain, high humidity off the water, and shaded, moss-prone north walls that rarely fully dry out, wood-based products are working against their nature for a large part of the year.
The practical consequences we've seen with engineered wood siding in this region:
- Edge and cut-end sensitivity. Any field cut, notch, or fastener penetration that isn't properly sealed becomes a moisture entry point. In a climate this wet, that's not a rare event — it's every cut on the job, on every wall, for the life of the siding.
- Caulk and paint maintenance is not optional. Wood-based siding depends on an intact paint film and caulk joints to keep water out. Skip a repaint cycle by a couple years — which happens easily — and you're inviting swelling, delamination, or rot at seams and butt joints.
- Moss and algae grip texture. The textured, semi-porous surface common on engineered wood panels gives moss and algae something to hold onto, and Anacortes' long damp season gives them plenty of time to establish. That means more frequent washing and more frequent repainting than a smoother, denser material.
- Salt air accelerates fastener and finish wear. Coastal air breaks down exposed fasteners and paint film faster than inland environments, which shortens the maintenance interval even further on a product that's already maintenance-dependent.
None of this means SmartSide "fails" — plenty of installations hold up fine with diligent upkeep. But it does mean the product's real lifetime cost and effort, in this specific climate, is higher than the sticker price suggests.
Why We Standardized on James Hardie
James Hardie fiber cement is made from cement, sand, and cellulose fiber — there's no wood fiber for moisture to swell, and no organic material for rot fungus to feed on. It's non-combustible, which matters given the wildfire smoke and ember risk that's become a regular part of Pacific Northwest summers. And it's engineered specifically for this region: Hardie's HZ5 product line is formulated for the wetter, harsher climate zones the Pacific Northwest falls into, addressing moisture and freeze-thaw performance directly rather than relying on maintenance to compensate.
The other piece is the factory finish. Hardie's ColorPlus finish is baked on in a controlled factory environment, not brushed on at the jobsite, and it's backed by its own finish warranty separate from the product warranty. That matters directly for the maintenance-diligence problem above — a factory finish holds up far longer against UV, salt air, and moisture than field-applied paint, which reduces the repaint burden that drives most of the long-term cost difference between the two products.
Side-by-Side Summary
| Factor | LP SmartSide | James Hardie |
|---|---|---|
| Core material | Engineered wood strand | Fiber cement |
| Moisture behavior | Absorbs; depends on sealed finish | Non-organic; dimensionally stable |
| Fire rating | Combustible | Non-combustible |
| Factory finish | Primed; field-painted | ColorPlus factory finish available |
| Repaint interval | Shorter, climate-dependent | Longer with ColorPlus |
| Upfront cost | Generally lower | Generally higher |
Our Standard, Not a Knock on LP
We don't install LP SmartSide, vinyl, or unfinished wood siding — not because those products can't be installed correctly, but because we've made a professional decision to stand behind one system that we believe performs best against Skagit County's specific mix of salt air, sustained rain, and moss. Fiber cement lets us install once and have the warranty, finish, and material chemistry all working together instead of against the climate.
If you're weighing siding options for your Anacortes home, we're happy to walk through what we see on both sides in person and answer questions honestly — no pressure, no hard sell. Reach out for a free estimate and we'll take a look at your home's specific exposure and give you a straight answer on what makes sense.