Different Types of Conservatory Blinds
Venetian conservatory side blinds
Venetian blinds can be used to great effect in conservatories and offer an almost unparalleled ability to vary and direct the amount of sunlight that you allow into your conservatory.
Timber venetian blinds can be obtained in a variety of colours and slat sizes to suit your requirements, and it is also possible to obtain aluminium venetian blinds, again in a variety of colours. The only practical downside to venetian blinds in your conservatory is that they do tend to trap dust particularly efficiently and as a result may require more care and maintenance than other types of blind.
Venetian blinds can be fitted professionally or as a DIY proposition. They can be ordered to size or purchased off the shelf from a variety of sources and cut to the correct size and adjusted to the required vertical drop by removing one or more slats.
Venetian blinds may tend to flap around slightly in a breeze or wind when closed as with fabric roman blinds or roller blinds although some now come with hold-down brackets which hold the lowest part of the blind in place when it is fully lowered, restricting movement.
Vertical conservatory side blinds.
Vertical blinds are much the same as venetian blinds, the only practical differences being that the slats or panels open at 90 degrees to those of a venetian blind. As with venetian blinds they hang from a guide rail at the top . Vertical blinds are most commonly made using fabric panels they are not suited to areas prone to condensation and high levels of moisture without special treatment. They will tend to flap about in a breeze or wind as with roller or roman blinds.
Pinoleum conservatory side blinds
Pinoleum, or French pinoleum, is a wood-weave made from selected woods. Pinoleum side blinds are a type of roman blind and they create a traditional Colonial look – particularly in conjunction with pinoleum conservatory roof blinds. Pinoleum blinds also complement conservatory furniture made from natural materials such as wicker. They are lightweight and so are an ideal candidate for motorisation and therefore also for automation.
Conservatory Roof Blinds
The conservatory roof area is likely to be responsible for most of the light and solar gain entering the conservatory and a significant amount of the heat loss and light loss, and so special materials are required in order to help combat this. As the roof design and dimensions of conservatories vary greatly it is generally considered to be a better option to opt for the professional supply and installation of conservatory roof blinds. Care should be taken to ensure that the chosen option will not sag in use as gravity is essentially working against a roof blind – this is in contrast to side blinds which are further tensioned and improved by gravity.
A poor quality or badly fitted roof blind will tend to sag in the middle and it is a good idea to find a solution where the fabric or other material is permanently under tension in order to prevent this. Some solutions use side guides or support wires to keep the blind in shape.
If bespoke blinds are used for your conservatory roof they can be made to measure to suit your conservatory specifically and installed by a specialist to ensure the best fit and operation. While a bespoke option is not a cheap undertaking it will provide far better results than any DIY proposition and is likely to last longer – they will also in most cases be guaranteed for a number of years.
Pleated conservatory roof blinds
One of the most popular and efficient types of conservatory roof blind is the pleated fabric type. These are fitted to the roof panels as self-contained units and as they are very close to the surface of the glass they are unobtrusive, elegant and effective at keeping light and heat in and out depending on your requirements. They can be manufactured to open from top to bottom, bottom to top, or from side to side and can be either partially or fully opened. Fabrics can be obtained in a wide variety of colours, shades and opacities. Special thermal control fabrics can be used to increase their performance further.
Fabric types such as Duette, which uses a compressible honeycomb structure for greater insulating performance and structural rigidity can be employed in conservatory roof blinds as an alternative to a single-pleat fabric and these often look better in situ as the guide wires can be hidden inside the fabric.
Pleated blinds are not limited solely to rectangular shapes – they can be triangular, trapezoidal or in fact pretty much any regular shape that they can expand to fill. This gives you the option to either have a blind per pane of glass, or a blind mounted over several panes of glass in one plane of the roof structure.
In general, the thinner the pleat, the better the blind will look in both the open and closed position and the closer it will be to the surface of the glass. The fabric used in pleated conservatory blinds is lightweight and this makes it suitable for motorisation and automation as well as manual control.
Pinoleum conservatory roof blinds
Pinoleum is essentially a wood weave made from selected woven wood. Pinoleum blinds create a traditional Colonial look and their natural gaps in the weave only let a proportion of the light through when closed. They are lightweight and so are an ideal candidate for motorisation and also automation.