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

Shutters, shades, and blinds–oh my! The range of differing window treatments available can become too much when you are looking to pick one for your Virginia Beach property. Understanding the differences between each type will assist you in deciding which styles will function and look best on the windows you have. We can help by exploring the advantages, disadvantages, and ideal locations for interior shutters, window shades, and window blinds in Virginia Beach.

The Pros And Cons Of Louvered Shutters

Plantation shutters are built from natural wood or a wood synthetic and go within your home where they are permanently affixed to your window with the product’s frame built around the window frame. Easy-to-move panels within the frame smoothly glide open for total sunshine and an unobstructed view or fasten securely to encompass your window for privacy and darkness. If the panels are shut, you are also able to rotate the rows of louvers for partial light and manipulate them to redirect light wherever you want.

The Pros

Interior shutters stand out from other window treatments thanks to their specialized design. Along with their unmistakable look, they also provide several amazing benefits for Virginia Beach interiors:

• Enhance your home with beautiful architectural detail

• Find them in neutral tones to complement your interior now and down the road if you redecorate

• Offer complete privacy and near-total darkness when closed

• Open effortlessly for light and a view

• Work with any specialized window like circles and sunbursts

• Move unwanted glare with the slats

• Easy to dust off

• Offer an amazing degree of energy efficiency

• A permanent feature that increases your Virginia Beach property’s value

• A range of customization options to design the look you want while fulfilling your specific requirements

On top of these pros, faux-wood Polywood® shutters have their own noteworthy virtues: 

• Unsurpassed toughness with resistance to damage that comes with heat, cold, damp conditions, and UV rays

• Will never be impacted by distorting, cracking, or nicking

• Patented weather protection for noticeable energy efficiency and cost-savings

Really, Polywood shutters will do anything you ask a window treatment to do, from elevating your window’s style to stopping cold air and harmful UV rays. They’ll even function and look just as great decades later as the date you installed them.

The Cons

Interior shutters’ one downside is that they can only be found in neutral tones. While their versatile coloring matches all kinds of decor, you’ll be required to opt for window shades or blinds if you must have window treatments in vivid colors or patterns.

How To Use Plantation Shutters

You are able to utilize louvered shutters on any window in your Virginia Beach residence. Custom shutters fit every type, size, and shape of window without losing their function. Put them on rounded, triangular, and French door windows just as effortlessly as normal rectangular windows.

You are also able to place Polywood shutters in any room. Use them for their resilience and efficiency in wet bathrooms, cold attic dormers, or sun-splashed south-facing rooms. Shutters even work great in heavily occupied areas and kids’ rooms since they don’t use cords that pose a safety risk.

The Pros And Cons Of Window Shades

Window shades can be found in a range of different styles, but, for the most part, all feature a sheet of fabric mounted above your window. You typically pull the fabric up or down to enclose and uncover your window using a built-in pull bar or cord, but you will also find motorized shades too.

Window shades don’t feature slats to manage illumination and privacy, but more transparent or less tightly woven fiber shades are able to allow light into darkened areas while obstructing the sightline into your interior. Or you could use top-down/bottom-up options that give you the chance to reveal the top of your window for light while maintaining your privacy on the lower half.

The Pros

Virginia Beach homeowners enjoy window shades because they can be found in a range of materials, styles, and colors. You’ll see shades with neutral colors and vibrant tints, one color or eye-catching patterns, see-through or blackout opacities, pleated fabric or natural fibers, and many other possibilities. If you’re looking for a stylish focal point when overhauling a space, window shades in the ideal color or fabric will enhance your overall design and cover your windows.

Distinct window shade types have their own advantages as well. Roller shades have a restrained feel. Cellular shades will boost efficiency. Tumble shades are nice additions to door windows. And sheer shades provide a pleasant combination of filtered light and privacy.

The Cons

Window shades don’t offer the resiliency of firm window treatments and are often a chore to clean. Their materials will in time fade due to the sun or might rip, grow mold, or be tarnished with stains. You might expect to replace window shades every few years as they break down or you alter your home’s style.

Window shades also offer less capability in balancing exterior light and privacy than louvered shutters. Even pulling them up part-way means you forgo your privacy on a portion of the window and you’re unable to adjust how the sunlight streams in at the bottom. And many window shades will show your shadow if your lights are on at night. And square window shades in Virginia Beach make you to pick between concealing a non-standard window’s distinctive shape or leaving the window bare at all times.

How To Utilize Window Shades

Numerous Virginia Beach property owners opt for window shades because they want bold or patterned window products to blend with their design. They work best in less active areas where they won’t get damaged by frequent use.

You can also use some types of window shades for their specific purposes. Go with cellular shades to help block cool air from entering. Slim roller shades work in spots where you don’t want a larger window treatment. Blackout shades stop sunlight to get a better night’s rest. Woven fiber shades incorporate a feeling of nature to your home. And remember, custom shades will without a doubt look and work better on your windows than off-the-rack shades.

The Pros And Cons Of Window Blinds

Window blinds consist of long, connected slats built from a firm material that you lower over your windows to cover them. Blinds can be used with cords or cordless functionality. In addition to shielding windows with blinds, you may also tilt the slats with a rod for more control over sunlight.

The Pros

The virtues of window blinds are dependent on what they’re made of. By design, all blinds shield windows to impede exterior light and the view within your Virginia Beach residence, but their type of material and construction are essential in how well they do this. You might see sunshine and outlines of people with low-grade vinyl blinds. Vinyl and aluminum blinds also bend and break without much difficulty, which leaves unsightly spaces that allow outside light. For these blinds, their low price and lack of durability make them beneficial mostly as short-term window coverings.

Quality natural wood and faux-wood blinds have stronger slats that envelop windows much better. You won’t have to worry about seeing through them, and they don’t damage rapidly. The wood or synthetic construction, joined with the attractive defined contours of the slats, look more sophisticated as well. Top-end natural wood and faux-wood blinds can be found in classic neutral tones that go with the decor of any area.

Blinds permit you to direct the quantity of light that comes through your windows. You may draw them up for an unhindered view and complete light or guide them down for privacy and a dark room. If your blinds are lowered, you can also rotate the slats for a partial view and a bit natural light.

The Cons

Wood and faux-wood blinds look similar to interior shutters but aren’t as tough. The cords intertwined with the slats may fray over time, and wood slats could distort and crack from an abundance of moisture or extreme temperature variations. Blinds also include lots of components that will cause them to be a challenge to clean, and the common pull cords may get tangled up or stick as you try to manipulate them.

Despite the fact that custom blinds will fit your windows in terms of size, they don’t have the total coverage around the borders that shutters do since they aren’t enclosed by a frame. You’ll also notice that both window blinds and shades in Virginia Beach can sway and slap your window if jostled or caught in a gust of air. This motion lets people see in and permits light.

How To Utilize Window Blinds

High-end blinds are a great choice in any room on rectangular or square windows. Only install water-resistant faux-wood blinds in moist spaces like kitchens and baths. And automated or cord-free blinds provide safer products when you have kids or four-legged friends.

Sunburst Has It All From Louvered Shutters To Window Blinds And Shades In Virginia Beach

Need to know more about the differences between interior shutters, window blinds, and window shades in Virginia Beach? Sunburst Shutters Virginia Beach offers the most incredible lineup of premium window treatments around and will is pleased to answer whatever questions you have. We provide no-charge in-home consultations to exhibit our products and give you a chance to decide which window treatments are right for your residence. Arrange yours by placing a call to 757-210-6448 or submitting the form below.