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By Radu Oprea, Owner, Wolf Spirit Deck · Illinois Contractor License #TGC119852 · Naperville, IL · Last updated: June 2026 A pool deck takes more abuse than a regular deck, and most homeowners don’t find that out until year two. You pick a material because you liked the color in the showroom, then a July afternoon hits, the kids are running back and forth from the water, and the boards you chose are either too hot to stand on or already going gray where the splash lands. I’ve replaced enough of these around Naperville to know which materials hold up next to a pool and which ones I’d talk you out of. Here’s the honest […]

By Radu Oprea, Owner, Wolf Spirit Deck · Illinois Contractor License #TGC119852 · Naperville, IL · Last updated: June 2026 The railing is the part of the deck people touch every day and the part most homeowners think about last. By the time someone calls us, they have usually settled on the boards and the layout, and railing is an afterthought we sort out at the design table. That order is backwards. Railing is often the second biggest line item on the quote after the decking itself, and the choice changes how the finished deck looks more than almost anything else. So here is the honest comparison I give people when they sit down with […]

By Radu Oprea, owner of Wolf Spirit Deck. Illinois Contractor License #TGC119852. Naperville office: 2020 Calamos Ct, Suite 200. I have dug footings in a lot of Naperville backyards. After enough of them, you learn that the dirt changes more than people expect across a town this size. A deck I build for a house off Ogden Avenue and a deck I build for a house three miles south near the DuPage River are not the same job below the surface, even if the deck on top looks identical. Most homeowners never think about this. They get a quote, they pick a board color, and they assume the part nobody sees is standardized. It mostly […]

By Radu Oprea, Founder of Wolf Spirit Deck Every year around mid-June, the phone calls change. The spring calls are about design and decking colors. The June calls start the same way: “We love the deck you built us, but we can’t sit on it after seven o’clock.” It is always the mosquitoes. I have built decks across Naperville and the surrounding suburbs for more than a decade, and I have watched a lot of beautiful decks sit empty on perfect summer evenings because nobody planned for the bugs. So before you spend money on a screen room or a fancy cover, I want to walk you through what actually works here, what doesn’t, and […]

By Radu Oprea, owner of Wolf Spirit Deck (Illinois Contractor License #TGC119852) People are usually surprised when we steer them away from wood. We build decks for a living. A wood deck is cheaper to put up, which means a smaller invoice and an easier sale, so you’d think we’d push it. We don’t, at least not for most homes here. After enough years building across Hinsdale and the towns around it, I’ve watched too many beautiful new wood decks turn gray and splintery by their third or fourth winter. So when someone calls us as their deck builders in Hinsdale and asks for a wood deck, the first thing we do is ask what […]