9.17.2014

Renter's Design Dilemma #2: Vertical Blinds


First off, a big, fat THANK YOU to those of you who threw in your two cents about design dilemma #1 on Monday. This is why I love the blogging community - y'all always have such great ideas! At this point I'm leaning toward using beadboard on that wall, but we shall see.

 To bring you up to speed if you missed Monday's post, here's what that back wall looks like:


This brings me to design dilemma #2. On the brown tile wall next to the fireplace we have an awesome, big sliding glass door that leads to the back patio. It lets in tons of light and it's really nice having easy access to our outdoor space off the living room. There's one tiny problem with that sliding glass door though: there are these (kinda nasty) old vertical blinds across the whole that I would love to hide, mask, disguise, take down...

Very 1970s-ish, eh?


They're made of some sort of beige synthetic "cloth" material and they are dust. magnets. Not awesome. Also, get a good look at that header - it's pretty yucky (how does that happen, by the way? No one ever touches it or anything!).

From what I can tell, they're pretty well installed and wouldn't be easy to take down, so sadly, I'm not sure that's going to be the solution. My best bet might just be to disguise them. On Monday, a couple of you got a head start on how to deal with these and mentioned putting up floor-to-ceiling curtains to bring in some color and softness to that part of the room, which sounds awesome. I'm a big fan of the idea. I'd have to put a curtain rod on the ceiling or something to install them since I can't drill into the tile. That might work though.

I also might make some kind of cornice/pelmet box to hide that stained header.

I love this curtain/pelmet box combo.


Or maybe something with more pattern?



Or I might keep it simple and throw a piece of molding up there right on top of the existing header. :)

(P.S. can I just say there are a lot of ugly sliding glass door window treatments out there. Google it. Enjoy!)

Here's one more good lookin' pelmet/curtain combo:


Can you tell I'm liking the simple white curtain with trim idea?

What do you think? What would you do to hide/disguise those vertical blinds? Thanks for letting me brainstorm here with y'all today. I know you've got some good ideas for me!


I'm headed out of town for work for the rest of the week, so I'm skipping this Friday's Lovely Links post. I'll be back on my normal schedule next week!

6 comments:

  1. I think the pelmet and curtain combo looks great. That way even if you do have to keep them, they probably won't be visible when they are open. If your curtains are pretty full, the blinds should slide right behind them. We have two big sets of sliding glass doors in our house but they face the woods so I don't have to worry about privacy so I just have curtains, no blinds. Good luck!

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  2. A typical window blind is made up of several long horizontal or vertical slats of various types of hard material, including wood, plastic or metal which are held together by cords that run through the blind slats. Roller/Solar Shades

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  3. I want to replace my thin metal blinds with something more durable and less attractive to dirt. Are there any natural dust repellent materials out there today. I'm mildly asthmatic and I really hate coughing fits induced by dust.
    http://www.anningcurtains.com.au/products/blinds

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  5. All these roller blinds are really great. Generally, blinds are used to prevent the direct sun rays in the home. Using venetian blinds which is the great collection of the blinds.

    ReplyDelete

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