How To Differentiate Between Plantation Shutters, Window Shades, And Window Blinds In Seattle

Shutters, shades, and blinds–oh my! All the different window treatments on the market will often feel too much if you have to select one for your Seattle home. Grasping how to differentiate between each variety will aid you in determining which products will be best on the windows you have. Let’s explore the pros, cons, and top spots for louvered shutters, window blinds, and window shades in Seattle.

The Pros And Cons Of Louvered Shutters

Interior shutters are built from natural wood or a highly durable composite and go into your residence where they secure permanently to your window with a shutter frame positioned over the window’s framework. Hinged panels inside the frame open up for complete light and an unobstructed view or shut tightly to encompass your window for a dark, private interior. When the panels are secured, you are also able to rotate the slats for some light and adjust them to divert light where it needs to go.

The Pros

Louvered shutters are distinctive from other options thanks to their unique design. They not only look quite different but supply several amazing benefits for Seattle properties:

• Enhance your home with beautiful architectural styling

• Come in neutral hues to blend with your interior at the moment and later if you change your home’s look

• Give You total privacy and nearly full darkness when closed

• Open effortlessly for light and views to your property

• Fit any specialized window like half-circles and hexagons

• Move glare with the louvers

• A cinch to dust off

• Offer superior energy efficiency

• An enduring fixture that adds to your Seattle house’s value

• Various customization options to craft the look you desire while meeting your unique needs

Along with these advantages, faux-wood Polywood® shutters feature their own notable virtues: 

• Unmatched durability with resistance to distress that comes with heat, cold, damp conditions, and UV rays

• Never experiences distorting, cracking, or chipping

• Exclusive weather sealing for noticeable efficiency and money savings

Really, Polywood shutters will do anything you ask a window covering to perform, from enhancing your window’s appearance to blocking cold air and destructive ultraviolet rays. They also function and look just as great decades later as the day you have them installed.

The Cons

Louvered shutters’ single downside is that they come only in neutral colors. While their versatile hues match all kinds of style choices, you’ll need to go with window shades or blinds if you must have colorful or patterned window treatments.

How To Utilize Louvered Shutters

You can utilize interior shutters on any window in your Seattle residence. Custom shutters accommodate any shape and size of window without losing functionality. Put them on half-circle, triangular, and patio door windows just as easily as regular square or rectangular windows.

You are also able to install Polywood shutters in any area. Choose them for their longevity and energy efficiency in damp bathrooms, cold attic dormers, or sun-filled rooms. Shutters also make sense in family spaces and children’s rooms as they don’t use cords that create a safety hazard.

The Pros And Cons Of Window Shades

Window shades come in a range of differing styles, although, by and large, all have a piece of fabric positioned over your window. You typically pull the material down or up to enclose and uncover your window through the bottom pull bar or corded mechanism, but you can locate motorized options too.

Window shades don’t use louvers to control sunlight and privacy, but more transparent or less tightly woven fiber shades can permit light into dark areas while obscuring views into your home. Or you could utilize top-down/bottom-up shades that give you the chance to reveal the upper region of your window for light while protecting your privacy below.

The Pros

Seattle property owners enjoy window shades due to the fact they come in various styles, colors, and materials. You’ll see shades with common colors and bright hues, solid color or eye-catching patterns, sheer or non-transparent opacities, neatly folded fabric or fibrous materials, and many additional choices. If you want a stylish accent while overhauling a space, window shades in the ideal color or material will elevate your ambience and cover your windows.

Individual window shade styles have their own advantages too. Roller shades have a sleek look. Cellular shades are energy efficient. Tumble shades work well on door windows. And sheer shades give you an agreeable combination of privacy and sunlight.

The Cons

Window shades aren’t as durable as rigid window coverings and can be difficult to clean. Their materials will in time discolor due to the sun or can tear, develop mold, or be tarnished with stains. You should expect to replace window shades every three or four years as they wear out or you alter your interior design.

Window shades also offer less capability in balancing sunlight and privacy than interior shutters. Even pulling them up part of the way means you forgo your privacy on some of the window and you’re unable to change how the sunlight streams in. And a range of window shades will display shadows if your lights are on at night. And rectangular window shades in Seattle make you to pick between masking a non-standard window’s distinctive size or keeping the window exposed permanently.

How To Incorporate Window Shades

Most Seattle residents choose window shades when they are looking for specific colors of window treatments to go with their design. They are best suited for low-traffic spaces where they won’t wear as quickly from steady engagement.

You might also use certain window shades for their particular purposes. Go with cellular shades to help block exterior airflow. Slim roller shades fit in spaces where you can’t use a larger window treatment. Blackout shades keep bedrooms dark to get a better night’s rest. Woven fiber shades bring a natural element to your home. And of course, custom shades will always look and work better on your windows than store-bought shades.

The Pros And Cons Of Window Blinds

Window blinds consist of long, connected slats made of a firm material that you lower over your windows to conceal them. Blinds function with a cord or cordless lifting mechanisms. As well as concealing windows with blinds, you are also able to rotate the slats open or closed with a bar for extra control over natural light.

The Pros

The benefits of window blinds largely depend on on their material. In principle, all blinds cover windows to obstruct outside light and sightlines into your Seattle home, but their substance and quality of manufacturing determine how successfully they accomplish this. You may observe sun and shadows with cheap vinyl blinds. Aluminum and vinyl blinds also curve and fracture with ease, leaving unsightly spaces that permit light. For these blinds, their low price and lack of durability make them beneficial primarily as interim window coverings.

Quality natural wood and faux-wood blinds have more robust slats that cover windows more completely. You won’t have to worry about seeing through them, and they don’t damage easily. These materials, mixed with the attractive straight contours of the slats, have a more sophisticated look too. Superior real wood and faux-wood blinds can be found in classic neutral colors that look lovely in any area.

Blinds permit you to manage the amount of light that enters through your windows. You can move them up for an unhindered view and full sunlight or close them for privacy and an absence of light. If your blinds are closed, you are also able to rotate the slats for a partial view and some sunshine.

The Cons

Wood and faux-wood blinds appear similar to interior shutters but aren’t nearly as durable. The cords intertwined with the slats may unravel in the long run, and wood slats could become misshapen and crack from an abundance of humid air or intense temperature fluctuations. Blinds also include a great deal of components that might make them difficult to clean, and blinds with pull cords might get twisted up when you attempt to manipulate them.

Although custom blinds will fit your windows in terms of size, they can’t give you the total coverage along the borders that shutters do because they don’t have a frame. You’ll also discover that both window blinds and shades in Seattle can shift and slap your window if jostled or taken by a breeze. That motion opens a sightline to your interior and permits light.

How To Use Window Blinds

Custom blinds make sense in any space on traditionally sized windows. Be sure to use waterproof faux-wood blinds in moist spaces like baths and kitchens. And motorized or cordless blinds offer safer products in the event you have little ones or animals.

Sunburst Has An Incredible Selection From Plantation Shutters To Window Blinds And Shades In Seattle

Need to know more about the the variances between louvered shutters, window blinds, and window shades in Seattle? Sunburst Shutters Washington offers the most incredible selection of premium window treatments in town and will is pleased to answer any questions you might have. We provide complimentary in-home consultations to demonstrate our options and let you determine which window treatments are right for your home. Schedule yours by calling 360-464-2277 or filling out the following form.