Why we stopped specifying matte black
- Written by
- Mira Halden
- Filed under
- Material
- Published
- February 2024
- Reading time
- One minute
It photographs beautifully and lives badly
Matte black hardware looks superb on the day of the photograph and for roughly a fortnight afterwards. Then it acquires the two things a matte finish cannot hide: the oils from a hand, and the small bright scratch where a screwdriver slipped. A gloss finish sheds the first and a brushed finish disguises the second. Matte black does neither.
We specified a lot of it between 2018 and 2022, and we went back to enough of those projects to stop.
The fitter’s mistake problem
A brushed or satin metal has a direction and a texture, so a mark made during installation reads as part of the surface. A powder-coated matte black has neither, so every mark reads as damage. That puts a burden on installation that is not fair to the person holding the screwdriver, and it is a burden that lasts as long as the ironmongery does.
A finish that only looks right when it is perfect is a finish that will look wrong for most of its life.
What we use instead
Brushed stainless for anything wet or hard-worked. Unlacquered brass where a client actively wants the patina and has been shown a photograph of what it looks like in year three. Bronze where the budget allows. All three age in a direction, which is the property we are actually buying.
Where it still earns its place
On a slim steel frame, a rooflight, or a window section — anywhere the black is a line rather than a surface, and nobody touches it. Matte black was never the problem. Matte black on a handle was.
Founder of Urbic. Twelve years of interior architecture in Copenhagen, most of it spent arguing about wall finishes and the order in which decisions get made. Writes the journal between site visits, and occasionally revises it after them.
Mira Halden — Founder
More from the journal
Material notes, site diaries, and the odd second thought.
