What’s the Right Hard Window Treatment for You?

Blinds & Shades, Curtains, Draperies, Shutters, Window Treatments

Sunshine Drapery sliding glass doors window treatment

If you haven’t shopped for a hard window treatment in a long time, you can easily be baffled by all of the choices available. Today’s consumer can choose:

Roller shades
Honeycomb (cell) shades
Roman shades
Privacy sheers
Hard and soft verticals
Wood and faux wood blinds
Woven woods (both horizontal and vertical)
Screen shades
Mini blinds

So how do you make that important decision for your home? The first step is to really look at how you will use them. Are you someone who lifts the shade to the top of the window in the morning and seldom puts it down until nightfall? Then, you have unlimited options. However, those who want to keep the shade down and havemovableslats or vanes to control the view have more limitations. Roller, roman, woven woods and honeycomb shades are either up or down. You can certainly add features – like top/down, bottom/up – to increase their functionality, but they do limit your view of the outdoors. Some, the honeycomb in particular, do offer filtered light when they are closed. If you need some privacy all the time, you would be better off selecting privacy sheers, a wood/faux wood, vertical or mini blind. These options create a privacy barrier while at the same time giving you the option of controlling your view. Other issues to consider when making your selection are price, wear ability and cleaning methods. Because there is a wide price range within these hard treatments, there is an affordable product for everyone. The presence of children and pets can influence your selection based on wear ability and cleaning methods. These guidelines should help you cut through the baffling choices in hard window treatments.