Winterizing Outdoor Furniture: What to Store, Cover, or Leave Out

Winter damage to outdoor furniture is rarely the cold itself. It is water getting somewhere it cannot drain, then freezing and expanding — inside a hollow frame, in a seam, under a coating. Everything below follows from that one mechanism.

What can stay out

• HDPE lumber. It does not absorb water, rot or rust, and it is heavy enough not to blow about. Adirondack chairs and HDPE seating genuinely need nothing.
• Teak. Structurally fine outdoors indefinitely; it simply weathers toward grey. Keep it off wet ground so it is not sitting in standing water.
• Aluminium frames. Cannot rust. Worth covering only to keep them clean.

What wants covering or storing

• Steel frames, powder-coated or not. The coating is the only thing between the steel and rust, and a chip plus a winter of moisture is all it takes. Cover them, and touch up chips before the wet season rather than after.
• Resin wicker. Cold makes the weave more brittle, and a season of freeze-thaw finds any weakness. Store it if you can, cover it if you cannot.
• All cushions, unless the maker explicitly says otherwise. Water-resistant covers shed a shower and soak through in sustained rain, and damp foam in an unheated space is how mildew starts.
• Umbrellas. Always close and ideally store them. A canopy left open through a winter gale is the single most common write-off in this category.

The drainage point

Before covering anything, make sure water can get out:

• Tip chairs and tables so water does not pool in seat pans or on tabletops.
• Check that hollow legs and tube ends are not sealed with dirt — many frames have small drainage holes that clog.
• Do not leave anything standing in a puddle or on soil that stays saturated.

This is why a cover alone sometimes makes things worse. A tight, non-breathable cover over a damp frame traps moisture against it, and you get more corrosion and mildew than if you had left it uncovered. Use a breathable cover, and make sure the furniture is dry when you put it on.

Storing cushions properly

Cushions are the part that fails first, and storage is where most of that damage happens.

1. Clean them first. Organic matter — pollen, food, leaf litter — is what mildew feeds on. Storing dirty cushions guarantees the problem.
2. Dry them completely, including the foam. A cushion that feels dry on the surface can be wet inside; give it real time in the sun or somewhere warm.
3. Store somewhere dry and ventilated. A sealed plastic bin in an unheated garage traps whatever moisture is left. A breathable storage bag, or a bin with the lid ajar in a dry space, works better.
4. Do not compress them under heavy items for months; the foam takes a set.

Fire pit tables and umbrellas

Propane fire pit tables need the tank disconnected and stored separately, outdoors and upright — never in a garage or basement. Cover the burner so water cannot sit in it and freeze, and empty any lava rock or glass that holds moisture.

Umbrellas should be dry before they are closed and stored; rolling a damp canopy tight and leaving it for months is a reliable way to grow mildew in the folds. Cantilever bases are usually too heavy to move, so cover the mechanism instead.

Ceramic, glass and stone

Anything with a glass tabletop should be stored flat or covered, since a freeze on a chipped edge can propagate. Ceramic — kamado-style pieces, glazed stools, planters — cracks if water gets into the material and freezes, so keep it dry and covered rather than merely cold.

In spring

Uncover early rather than late. A cover left on into a warm, wet spring traps humidity exactly when mould grows fastest, which undoes the point of covering at all. Check frames for chips before the season starts, and touch them up while everything is dry.

For what each material can tolerate in the first place, see how the five common materials fail, and what weather ratings actually commit a seller to.

Many outdoor furniture brands in this catalog sell primarily through Amazon and publish no manufacturer list price. Where that is the case, we show no price rather than presenting a retailer price as a manufacturer baseline. See our methodology.