It's your home. Your lifestyle, express it!

Whether you are looking to remodel your home or simply give it a new look, window treatments can impact the entire look of your home. When choosing treatments for your windows you have to know what to look for. Here are the 3 main things you want make sure you understand.

1 - Style

2- Function

3- Options

The style of a treatment can make the room feel heavy or make it seem open and light. For example, a roman shade with a "tear drop" effect or what is known as a hobbled roman shade, can be a heavy style for a smaller room. The reason is because you have the additional fabric that cascades on top of each other. If a roman shade is the way you would like to go, I would highly recommend looking into what's called the flat roman shade style. This style has a much cleaner, open, and modern feel to it. When the shade is completely down, the fabric lays flat, but when it's up or being pulled up, you still have the hobbled roman shade effect. The same way style is important with a roman shade, it is crucial when looking at wood blinds, honeycombs and plantation shutters. Remember that less is more!

The function part of the treatment comes into play when deciding what treatment to use in what room. If a window is above 6 feet from the ground, I would not recommend using a treatment that has to be pulled up by cord. Two things can happen, the pressure of the weight you are forcing upon the treatment can cause the treatment to simply fall or the mechanism will bust within a matter of a couple of months. A good rule of thumb is that you should not have to reach to get the controls, if the window is up high, simply ask for longer cords. If the window is high and you still want to use a treatment that is pulled up, ask our consultants to provide you with a continuous cord loop control or ask if remote controls are available for that specific treatment. This will ease the weight of the actual shade and it will make it really easy to be used on a daily basis without any concern of the treatment falling. Remember that just because a treatment looks good in a magazine or in someone else's home, doesn't mean that it will provide the same function to your own unique situation.

There are at least 12 different options for each window treatment in the industry. How can you tell which will work for you? You want to have a treatment that does its job, works fine and best of all looks great. Most of the options are like the extras when purchasing a car. Before you become overwhelmed, start with the basic treatment and when considering options think of function. Start with the types of mechanisms offered for that treatment, then move into the header or valance of the treatment, look at the different options and styles of each individual valance. Once that is done, look at the decor options such as, color of tassels, accent fabrics, cords, liners or frame styles. Remember that options should be used to compliment a treatment and not make it stand out. You want your home as a whole to be an expression of who you are, not just your window treatments!

To learn more about window treatments,

please contact our Design Consultant.