Most people don’t pay too much attention to blinds when they’re working on their home’s interior design.
But honestly, blinds can make or break the look of a room.
If you get a type of blind that isn’t intended for a specific room, it can look gaudy, or at worst they’ll be damaged by the wear and tear of day to day life in that room.
For example, if you hang wooden blinds in your bathroom the humidity and steam from day to day use of the bathroom will cause the wooden blind to get damp and will end up damaged.
So, with that worst case scenario in mind, what blinds work in what rooms? What sort of blinds should you be looking at and why should you be looking at them?
The Living Room/ Lounge (Any Blind You Like)
The living room/lounge is the easiest room in the house when it comes to buying your blinds as there are no environmental factors to consider in this room, so you won’t have to worry about any degradation of the blinds.
For the living room, the biggest consideration (other than style of course) is the size of your window as some blinds have size restrictions and can only be made to a certain maximum size. For example, vertical blinds can be made to measure up to around 4.5 metres wide but wooden Venetian blinds can only go up to around 2.4 metres wide.
So, if you have a particularly large window, or patio door, you’ll need to look for a wide blind such as a roller blind or a vertical blind.
Or if you have a smaller, more normal sized window, you’re free to choose any blind you desire.
The Bedroom (Blackout Roman or Roller Blind)
Again, in the bedroom, there are no environmental factors for you to have to consider, you just need a blind that blocks out light from outside and that fits into your bedroom’s design scheme.
The biggest thing to consider for a blind in the bedroom is it’s ability to block out light, so you should be looking at blackout type blinds. Blackout blinds are simply variations of normal blinds, but made with a thicker fabric to stop any light leaking into your bedroom.
So, for the bedroom, you’ll want to look into blackout roller blinds or blackout roman blinds as they fit all the needs of a bedroom blind.
Top Tip: No matter what type of blind you have, if you have gaps around the edges then it will not black out the light effectively so you need to make sure it all fits in nicely.
The Conservatory (Solar Reflective Conservatory Blinds)
Choosing blinds for a conservatory is pretty easy to do, as blind companies make Conservatory Blinds specifically made and intended to be fit into conservatories. These conservatory blinds are usually sliding pleated blinds which makes them very easy to measure and fit.
But, you should consider the light and heat in a conservatory, while it’s unlikely that the colour of the blind will fade due to the light, the heat can become a problem for the blinds as they fit into the rubber gasket on the conservatory panels.
So, when getting these blinds, try to get a set with solar reflective backing, this basically means the back of the blinds is covered in a fabric which will bounce back sunlight, which should leave your conservatory cooler in the heat.
The Bathroom (PVC Roller Blind or Faux Wood Venetian Blind)
When it comes to the bathroom you need to consider the environmental factors of the room, as your bathroom will be hot and steamy quite a bit which can cause some blinds to become damaged by the humidity of the room.
So for your bathroom, linen, real wood and metal blinds should be taken out of consideration as the linen & wood blinds will become damp and rot and the metal blinds will begin to rust. So ideally you’ll want a PVC based fabric blind as the PVC will make the blind resistant to the damp and can be easily wiped clean, or a faux wood blind, which is made of plastic to look like wood. Best advice would be to either get a PVC roller blind or a faux wood Venetian blind to go into your bathroom.
The Kitchen (PVC Roller Blind)
In your kitchen again, there are some environmental factors to consider, if you cook regularly you’ll need to be cautious of steam and smoke from the hob which could cause some damage if the blinds aren’t regularly cleaned, linen blinds will get damp and hold onto smells from the kitchen, wood blinds may deteriorate due to the steam and metal blinds may rust up. There are ways to prevent it, but that’s a bit of a faff.
You’ll also need to consider the fact that kitchens can get quite messy, so you’ll want them to be made out of an easy wipe material like PVC so you can get them cleaned easily should you spill anything on your blinds whilst cooking or eating, because of this, for the kitchen the best blind would be an easy wipe PVC roller blind as it can resist the smells and stains of kitchen life.