Keep Your House In Style: Top 5 Best Window Treatments

There are a few important things to consider in order to select the right window treatments for your house. By constantly seeing clients choosing the window treatments that they will dress their house with, I have been able to come up with the top 5 best window treatment options there are; there are a lot of window treatment options but I will list the ones that I like the most.

The best 5 window treatments you can install in your house are:

Dual Roller Shades
Honeycomb Shades
Plantation Shutters
Woven Woods
Faux Wood Blinds

Choosing window treatments depends on different factors like: having a specific issue to solve (increase your house energy efficiency), the style that you want your house to have (plantation shutters will achieve a more classical and elegant feel), the functionality you would like to provide to the space (wanting for shades to open and close at certain times of the day), and so on. There are a lot of things that one must consider. Below, I describe each treatment that I listed, and talk about why they made it to my top 5.

The first place goes to Dual Roller Shades

The top position gets taken by the Dual Roller Shades. I think that this is an easy win. What makes them the best treatment out there is the versatility they provide with the amount of light that comes in, the amount of privacy you get with both shades, and the modern style that they offer.

Having two shades on a window gives you so much control of how much light you let in. On every Dual Roller Shade, there is always a blackout shade (shade that lets no light come through) and a shade that you choose how much light will come through (it can be 10%, 5%, 3%, and 1% – percentage being how much light it allows to come through). With this in mind, you can have days you wake up first thing in the morning when the sun starts to shine, or days you extend your sleep time and remain in bed for hours after the sun comes up.

About the shades styles, there are so many options to choose from (referring to the brands that I work with) and I’m 99% sure that anyone will find a style made for them. You can check out the styles offered by the brands I use by clicking on the following links: Hunter Douglas’ roller shades, The Window Outfitters roller shades, and Timber Blinds’ roller shades; there are two links: link 1 is where you find the regular color collection and link 2 for the Altelier color collection.

As far as privacy goes, dual roller shades gives you a full range of options: you can have everyone see everything from the outside by leaving the shades open, you can lower the light filtering shade and have reduced view from the outside, or you can lower the blackout shade and block everything that goes on inside.

Overall, I don’t see any negative aspect to dual roller shades. They are by far my favorite window treatment. If you choose them as your window treatments you won’t regret it.

Honeycombs Shades

In second place, I chose the honeycombs shades. Again, the decision was pretty easy.

Hunter Douglas says that 30% of your home’s energy is lost through your windows. The first thing that must be said about honeycombs is that they are the best energy efficient window treatments out there. The US government said in “Energy Efficient Window Attachments” that “Insulated cellular shades are typically considered to have the highest R-values of all window coverings.” – the higher the R-value the greater the insulating power. This is achieved by the pockets inside the shade trapping air and making the temperature from the outside to enter your house in a lesser quantity, and the temperature from the inside to leave in a lesser quantity.

If you are interested, I recommend you read the post by energy.gov on energy efficiency in window treatments – click here.

As far as style goes, honeycombs look pretty cool. It is a new look that honeycombs provide. They make your house look modern and very casual – they do something that makes you feel a very “at home” sensation, I don’t know how to explain it, but the feeling they make you feel good. Perhaps these shades are not for everyone, but I highly recommend you to look at them in person and decide if you like them or not.

Here are links to the honeycombs offered by the brands I use: Hunter Douglas honeycombs and Timber Blinds honeycombs (The Window Outfitters don’t make honeycombs) – and I will maybe start using Norman (look at their honeycombs) to try them and perhaps they’ll make it to my top brands; who knows?

Finally, there are different functionalities available for any situation: if you have kids and pets and want to protect them, if you’re into tech and would like to have them operate with a motor, if you want to be able to raise the lower portion or to lower upper portion of the shade – there are different options that will fit your needs.

Plantation Shutters

Shutters will always have a special place in me. There is something about them that makes me like them a lot. I think it is because it makes the window on which they get installed feel very classical and homey.

As far as energy efficiency goes, they are actually pretty good. They are more effective in reducing the heat gain than reducing the cold weather from coming in, but they do help during the cold weathers as well. Because their panels get installed into the window opening, it will protect the whole window area from the heat and cold without leaving any openings. If you pick a highly reflective color it will reflect the sunlight and further lower its heat gain. And for cold weathers, the louvres can be open to let the sun in and warm up inside in.

Shutters can definitely be the most expensive treatment out there, more expensive than any other window treatment (there are only some fabrics for roller shades that make them more expensive than shutters). Their construction uses more material and takes longer to put together, and their installation is quoted per square feet therefore it’s pricier; overall they are the most expensive treatment.

Another cool thing about having shutters is that, if you have pets or children, they will be completely safe around them – there is nothing (that I can think of) with shutters that could harm your pets or children.

*Links to shutters by brand: Hunter Douglas, Timber Blinds, The Window Outfitters, and Norman.

Woven Woods

Woven woods hold a special place in my heart. It may be because my living room is dressed with woven woods; they make me enjoy my living room so much!

Woven woods made it to my list because they look so cool! They add an all natural look to the room they get installed in. If you are a person that enjoys natural looks and likes being outside, get woven woods; you can thank me later.

The reason they are not competing for the first three places is because they offer no energy efficiency and no privacy, unless you add a liner to the construction of the shade; adding a liner to the shades makes them a little pricier and makes them look no that cool, but it is possible. Personally, I like the woven woods with no liner – there is no way to see into my house through the windows with the woven woods unless you are in my backyard – and i’ll know if someone is in my backyard – so I didn’t need to add a liner to the shades.

Of the brands that I use only Hunter Douglas and Timber Blinds offer woven woods, the Window Outfitters and Norman don’t.

And last but not least: Faux Wood Blinds

The last spot of my top 5 window treatments I gave it to faux wood blinds. In my opinion, they do an OK job in all major categories: style, privacy, energy efficiency, and price. Let me explain:

As far as style goes, there is not a way to go wrong; you just have to pick the correct color that will go well with the rest of your house/room and done! Yes, there is nothing special regarding their style; they are not the best looking window treatments but they also don’t suck.

As for energy efficiency, the faux wood blinds do an OK job. Again, they are not the best nor the worst. Its efficiency can be better if you choose a reflective color.

Next, we have privacy. Because of how their operation system works (a cord to tilt the slats), you can either have vision into your room/space the blinds are in, or you can close the slats and have no vision through the slats.

Finally, let’s talk about their price. In this category faux wood does the best. They are definitely among the cheapest (if not the cheapest) custom window treatments out there. Some providers sell cheaper aluminum blinds, and yes, they can also be cool, but you have to look all around for a style to match the room they’ll get installed in.

Here are the links to the faux wood blinds from each brand: Hunter Douglas (they call their faux wood “alternative wood”), Timber Blinds, and Norman.