White uPVC is still the default, but it hasn’t been the only option for a while now, and for a lot of homes it isn’t even the best one.
Ask most people what a uPVC window looks like and they’ll picture the same thing, white frame, maybe slightly off-white after a few years in the sun. That image is outdated by about a decade now. Foil lamination technology moved fast, and the colour range on a modern uPVC profile is closer to what you’d expect from painted wood or powder coated aluminium than the plain white boxes people still associate with the material.
If you’re deciding right now, here’s the short version. Foil finishes are a thin decorative film bonded onto the base profile, so you get the colour and texture you want without giving up any of uPVC’s core properties. Insulation, low maintenance, none of it changes underneath the colour. What changes is the price, and how the frame reads against your elevation once it’s actually installed rather than sitting on a sample chip.
How a Foil Finish Actually Gets Onto the Frame
The base profile is always white or grey uPVC underneath, that part never changes no matter what colour ends up on the surface. A decorative film, usually PVC based itself, gets laminated onto it under heat and pressure, bonding permanently rather than sitting as a coat of paint that can chip or peel off in patches.
That’s why foil finished frames hold their colour so much better than a painted surface would. There’s no paint layer to scratch through and expose white underneath, the colour is the surface itself. Good lamination is also UV stabilised, and that’s really the part that decides whether a dark grey frame still looks dark grey in six years or starts fading unevenly on whichever side of the building catches the most sun.
Where This Goes Wrong on Cheaper Jobs
I’ve seen a handful of jobs, more than I’d like, where a client picked a striking foil colour off a sample chip, then the fabricator quietly used a lower grade film to save cost. Two years in, one side of the house, the west facing windows almost always, had visibly faded compared to the shaded side. Colour was never the problem. Film quality was. Worth asking directly what lamination brand and thickness someone’s actually quoting, not just trusting the swatch card.
Which Colours People Are Actually Choosing
White still leads. It’s the safe, familiar option, matches almost anything, and nobody has to think twice about it. But three shades keep coming up in nearly every design conversation we have these days, and honestly they’ve earned it.
Grey, particularly the mid to dark tones, has quietly become the default for anyone wanting a contemporary look without committing to full black. It hides dust better than white, and it plays well against almost any exterior wall colour. Then there’s wood-effect, walnut and oak mostly, which exists purely because people love the warmth of timber windows but not the upkeep that comes with real wood surviving Pune’s humidity and monsoon swings year after year. The better wood-effect foils are convincing enough now that a visitor sometimes assumes the frame is real timber, right up until they knock on it.
Black is the one that’s changed the most in the last two years though. We were barely quoting it in 2022. Now it shows up on a good chunk of our larger, glass-heavy openings, mostly because a slim dark frame lets the glass itself become the focus instead of the frame around it. Whether that trend keeps climbing or plateaus, hard to say. It hasn’t slowed down yet.
Two Colours On One Frame
A detail that surprises a lot of first time buyers, you’re not locked into one colour for both sides of the frame. Dual colour uPVC laminates a different foil on the exterior versus the interior, so a charcoal or wood-tone frame can face the street while plain white faces your ceiling and walls inside.
This solves a real problem more often than you’d think. A client’s exterior might be dark stone cladding where black looks sharp, but their interior is bright and minimal, white and light wood, where a heavy black frame would clash with every other surface in the room. Dual colour sidesteps the compromise entirely instead of forcing one choice to work for both sides.
What The Colour Choice Actually Costs
Coloured uPVC does cost more than plain white. No way around that. The lamination adds a manufacturing step, and decent films aren’t cheap to source. On a recent quote for a flat near Baner, the coloured option came in about 18 percent above the white baseline, though that figure moves depending on the shade, the film brand, and whether you’re going single sided or dual colour. Wood-effect tends to land toward the higher end since the texture and print process takes more work than a flat colour film.
Most clients who see a properly lit sample panel outdoors, next to their actual wall colour, end up going with the coloured option anyway once they’ve seen the difference in person rather than on a small indoor swatch.
Cleaning Coloured Frames Isn’t the Same as Cleaning White
Something we mention to nearly every client picking a darker or wood-tone finish. The cleaning routine shifts slightly. White hides dust and hard water spots reasonably well. Dark foils show every bit of it in direct sun, so a wipe-down that felt optional on white starts feeling necessary on charcoal or black within a month or two.
The bigger risk is cleaning products, not dirt. Certain abrasive cleaners or anything solvent heavy can dull a foil finish over time, leaving a faint hazy patch that’s genuinely hard to undo once it sets in. Mild soap and water, roughly the same thing you’d use washing a car, is all a laminated frame really needs.
Quick Answers
Does a coloured frame perform worse than white?
No. Purely cosmetic. Strength, insulation, weather resistance, all identical underneath.
Will dark colours fade faster in Pune’s sun?
Depends on the film. A cheap one fades unevenly regardless of colour. A quality UV-stabilised laminate holds up for years.
Can the inside and outside be different colours?
Yes, that’s dual colour, and it’s a lot more common than people assume before they find out it exists.
How much extra does colour cost over plain white?
It varies by shade and film brand, but expect somewhere between a sixth and a quarter more on top of the white price.
Bring us your elevation photos, or even just your exterior wall colour, and we’ll show you real outdoor sample panels instead of a printed catalogue.
