Householders in Brighton who may have been thinking of moving to a new home in the area or even out of the city might have been dismayed by the recent house price news, showing the amount they can sell their house for is falling.

If this is you, there are many things to consider. Of course, you may be able to counterbalance a lower sale price with the fact that the new home you want to buy will also cost less, but this may not always fit with your plans; people might wish to upsize, downsize or go to a different area where general prices are higher or lower than where they live now.

With Halifax being the latest lender to publish survey data showing prices are dropping and Purple Bricks founder Harry Hill recently telling the Mail on Sunday a recession and higher mortgage rates could lower them by as much as 20 per cent, this is clearly a real issue.

This situation means now may be a good time to look at alternatives, such as improving the home you have. Attractive interior design features such as solid window shutters could be a great place to start.

This is not just a way of making your home look more attractive to any prospective buyers viewing it. Home improvements can add value to your home at the very time when it would otherwise fall, ensuring it is of a higher value than when you bought it. Moreover, this kind of improvement is less costly or disruptive than major structural work like an extension or whole new kitchen.

Apart from that, however, a beautiful pair of window shutters can also make your home a more enjoyable place for you to live in. If you decide to stay there longer and wait until the housing market recovers or cancel plans to move altogether, it makes sense to enhance your own living space and make it beautiful, stylish and a joy to experience.

 

 

The ultimate use of solid wood shutters in the bedroom are blackout shutters that stop any light from getting in that could potentially disturb a person’s sleep.

Unlike blackout curtains or blinds, which use materials that could potentially move and cause small amounts of light to get in, solid blackout shutters are unlikely to move once closed, allowing for a more restful slumber.

However, the invention of blackout shutters and blinds was not, in fact, to keep light out of people’s homes but to do the exact opposite.

The concept of the blackout is most associated with the “home front” of the Second World War as established by Prime Minister Winston Churchill, although its origins can be traced to just before the First World War as a plan devised by the First Lord of the Admiralty Winston Churchill.

Initially, only coastal towns were affected, with bright lights being extinguished in an attempt to hide towns from potential attacks by battleships and U-boats. It was later expanded to the whole of England by 1916 once the German army started to use air raid tactics.

In the Second World War, the blackout was even more pronounced due to the extensive use of air raids and bombing attacks during the Blitz, with regulations being imposed even before the declaration of war in 1939.

This meant that all windows and doors needed to be covered by heavy, dark material or paint to stop any slight glimmer of light that could signpost a target to a bomber plane.

Street lights were dimmed, covered to point lights downwards or sometimes shut off completely, whilst headlamps and traffic lights had their lights deflected to the ground, which would ultimately lead to an increased number of car accidents at night.

Ultimately, by the end of the war, radio beams and radar were already being widely used, making the blackout far less effective, but the concept and the name stuck, its legacy is still used in reverse to stop bright light from invading our homes when we sleep.

Almost everyone who has blinds or shutters in their windows likes them, for they are sturdy, durable, great at keeping the light out or letting it in when needed and – of great importance when everyone is watching their energy bills – good insulators, as wood in particular is.  

All that should appeal to those who like something practical, sensible and robust, which in an age when getting value for money is as important as it ever was has to make sense.

However, those with an eye on design trends as we head towards 2023 may note that practicality is not everything and aesthetics has a big part to play. According to Hackrea, design will be a big thing in the world of blinds and curtains in the months ahead.

Among the trends in blinds it suggests will be in vogue are Roman blinds and roller blinds. The former, it suggests, will never go out of fashion, which is of course the greatest endorsement of all for any kind of furnishings. 

Roller blinds, which offer a more translucent look, are more suited to full length windows, something your local blinds company in Brighton will know all about with all the large Regency-style bay windows in the city. 

As ever, this time of year sees many predictions about the latest fashions and trends in interior design. New Interior Trends also expect 2023 to be one in which Roman blinds and roller blinds are popular, which is worth noting; often a comparison of two sets of predictions of upcoming styles and fashions finds wildly different forecasts.

New Interior Trends also expect some prominent trends to emerge among shutters. This includes eco-friendly materials, the use of bamboo, “unusual horizontal and vertical slots” and the use of “exclusive photo printing” on vertical blinds.

It remains to be seen if all these tips come to fruition, but it seems clear enough that if you are looking for blinds or shutters, aesthetics may play as much a part in your decision as practicality.

There is a considerable appeal in solid wood shutters, not merely for their aesthetic qualities but also their practicality.

Compared to Venetian blinds, solid shutters last longer, require much less maintenance and provide more effective light control. They also have a tendency to stay in style, unlike many blind styles.

However, a debate has emerged about the best material to make solid shutters between solid wood and medium-density fibreboard (MDF), an engineered wood that has a precise, smooth finish compared to hardwood, where the finish largely depends on the particular cut of wood.

In terms of aesthetics, MDF and wooden shutters look similar, especially once they are painted and sealed, although with the popularity of natural textures and materials, that can be a minor negative if you do not plan on painting the shutters white or a solid colour.

Both have their own strengths in terms of functionality as well. MDF is more durable, and the protective coatings regularly used with the material can make them easier to clean, whilst solid wood is stronger and lighter, due to the flexibility of the material.

This flexibility means that if you want oddly shaped shutters to fit unique windows, MDF is less suitable, and the weight means that they cannot be used for especially large openings such as doors and wide windows.

In rooms where humidity can become a factor, such as bathrooms and kitchen windows, wood can sometimes pose a problem as it changes shape and size in these hot, damp conditions, whilst MDF remains static.

The final consideration is cost, with MDF typically having a lower cost depending on what type of shutters you need.

Ultimately, whilst MDF shutters are a functional option in certain cases, solid, natural wooden shutters are the optimal choice for the vast majority of rooms, design schemes and use cases.

Whether as a Christmas present or looking ahead to the spring season ahead, quite a few people are looking into fitting solid wood shutters to their windows, particularly the ones at the front of their house where the privacy benefits are maximised.

However, a concept known as smart shutters might have caught their eye as an intelligent, easy way to automatically adjust their blinds for different conditions.

Smart shutters, like most smart devices, are shutters or solid blinds that use a technology known as the internet of things (IoT) to connect to a central home hub, which itself is activated via a smartphone.

This lets you open and close the blinds no matter where you are in the house, and allows you to schedule when shutters open and how much they open, allowing for much better light and temperature control than would be obtained manually.

Beyond the basic convenience of not having to get up and manually move shutters, there are some more substantial advantages to installing smart shutters, depending on the system you use and how it is set up.

Some shutter systems are fitted with light intensity sensors that can automatically adjust the position of slats to avoid glare and to help maintain an optimal target temperature, with settings that can be adjusted and saved depending on the season.

These sensors also can detect strong winds or potential projectiles and automatically close and retract to protect people inside the house, or open completely in case of a fire.

Given that smart shutters often cost a lot more to set up and sometimes require bespoke wiring, the question of whether they are worth it will vary considerably depending on how much that convenience and novelty are worth to you.

For most people and most types of shutters, smart shutters might add a little functionality if set up carefully, but for the most part, are not worth it right now for what they can offer.

Over the summer months during a particularly potent heatwave, one potential suggestion for helping to keep the heat out of a home was to fit solid wooden shutters that could not only create shade but also keep the blazing heat out.

With winter approaching and temperatures plummeting, could these very same shutters also help to keep your home warmer?

The answer is an emphatic yes, regardless of whether your shutters have been fitted to the inside or outside of your windows, as long as they fit across the entire area of your window and are made from solid material such as wood, a natural insulator.

To understand why, it is important to understand why any insulating material works in the first place.

Insulation works to stop heat flow, which can occur through either thermal conduction (where two objects of different temperatures touch each other) or thermal radiation, where the heat (or cold) that radiates from an object affects another object, such as how being near a fire keeps you warm.

Glass is famously very good at conducting heat, which is why it can sometimes feel colder than the ambient temperature, as well as why extreme temperature differences can cause it to shatter. Double glazing fixes this by having a vacuum layer between two sheets of glass which theoretically stops the cold from getting in as much.

Wooden shutters help this process partly by adding yet another layer between the cold air and your room, but also because the wood has many small holes and fibres that trap the cold air and create a barrier against the cold, similar to how a woollen coat keeps you warm precisely because it has holes between the fibres.

As a result, not only is a wooden shutter a beautiful addition to any room and not only has it proven effective at keeping the heat out in summer, it may be a sound investment to keep the heat in as well this winter.

By the 18th and 19th centuries, glassmaking and window pane installation had evolved to the point that most buildings could afford to have any glass fitted in their windowpanes, at least if they could afford to pay the window tax.

However, even with this in mind, shutters were still widely used in the 19th century, and in places such as the American Frontier, they were more popular than ever before, and for reasons that were equal parts an assertion of wealth and the result of practicality, depending on exactly where they were based.

In terms of practicality, they were often still used early on during the travels westward because glass windows were still a non-trivial expense that could not be wasted on log cabins and wooden buildings that might need to be abandoned quickly.

As a result, most windows were fitted with oiled paper, which whilst not transparent was at least translucent enough to allow light in.

Given that paper is not particularly resistant to the elements, it needed an additional layer of protection, which was often provided by solid wood shutters.

As frontier settlements became towns, these shutters were still used even as the paper was replaced by glass, primarily as a security method to secure buildings with valuable goods in them such as saloons and shops.

By contrast, in the American South, wooden shutters were used less as a necessity when battling the elements and more as a symbol of wealth and prosperity.

This was particularly the case with plantation complexes, which is why louvred shutters which can also be opened are known as plantation shutters. These were typically placed on the outside of a building to emphasise their nature as a status symbol, as well as a means to block and reflect bright sunlight.

As the era of the frontier ended with the dawn of the 20th century, wooden shutters have not only endured but a wider variety of them have become more accessible.

For many people living on Brighton, the windows can provide a huge source of light. Regency architecture was always designed to ensure that homes received plenty of natural illumination in an age when homes were lit by gas lamps and electricity was still some way off.

Depending on the time of year, this can be a mixed blessing. While the long light days of summer can provide lots of pleasant evening illumination, they can cause problems in the morning; without effective means of blanking out the light, residents may find they are awoken very early by the summer sun’s dazzling rays.

However, now autumn is beginning a different proposition presents itself. The mornings may be getting darker, but so are the evenings. Now the advantage of having lots of window space can be maximised to make the most of what there is.

This is why having full height wooden shutters in Brighton is so ideal. It is not just that they can keep the light out when required, but they are also great at opening up to let it in, whereas, for example, curtains can take up a lot of space at either end of the window and reduce the amount of light coming in. 

Other reasons for needing the great flexibility shutters offer is the fact that the sun can often be low at awkward angles at times of the day that won’t be a problem in summer – when it is higher – or winter, when it is lower. In Autumn, however, it may be at just the right angle to dazzle. No better time to keep the shutters closed.

The other side of that coin is you may want to keep the shutters open in the evening if the sun is setting, especially if you have a south-westerly view over the sea, where it can be a magnificent sight not to be missed. Either way, the flexibility full height shutters offer provides great flexibility to both let the sun in and keep it out. 

Summer in Brighton has been a hot time this year, with no lack of excuses to head for the seafront. But if the season has been great for splashing about in the sea, lazing on the beach or just getting out and about in the heat, the months ahead are a different prospect.

The end of summer will always bring some disappointments as the days get shorter, the leaves start to fall and cricket stumps are pulled up at Hove for the last time this year. But this year brings a real sense of foreboding as the Energy Price Cap soars and many will worry about how to keep their homes warm, especially in Regency buildings with high ceilings.

However, this is where the use of full height window shutters in Brighton can prove invaluable. The reason for this is that wooden shutters are by definition made from a material that insulates and, because they are made-to-measure and don’t leave lots of gaps for cold air to sneak through, will help keep the warmer air inside the room on cold nights. 

This could prove particularly essential in the winter ahead as the temperatures drop, as homes with good insulation will be better equipped to cope with the heating being used sparingly in order to keep energy bills down. Indeed, now may be a good time to invest in insulating measures of various kinds.

February is the coldest month of the year in Brighton, based on figures from the weather station at nearby Shoreham Airport, with an average of around six degrees. Being a seaside town and further south than most of Britain, the winter will be milder than in nearly every other part of the UK.

Even so, it will still get cold, so now is the time to take steps to ensure your home is kept as well-insulated and warm as possible, helping you use less energy while still remaining warm in the coming months.

When redecorating your bathroom, there are so many fixtures and fittings to consider, you might not even think about how to dress the windows until the last minute. Although it can be tempting at this point to opt for the safe choice of blinds, it is worth opening your mind and thinking of wooden shutters instead.

This is because there are so many benefits of choosing shutters for your bathroom, starting with being able to control privacy in this personal space. As shutter slats can be open either partly or fully, homeowners can easily alter the exposure they want through their windows.

Café-style shutters are particularly ideal for this, as the top part can be kept open to allow light into the room, while the bottom half can be closed when one is changing or in the shower. This also enables homeowners to control the amount of light in the room, which is particularly useful in a small or dark bathroom.

Another benefit of shutters in bathrooms is they are easy to clean. They simply need wiping down when they become dusty. They are known to dry quickly, preventing them from deteriorating in the moist air. This is unlike blinds, which easily become damp and, therefore, end up mouldy in humid washrooms.

Although many people would think wood is not the best material for bathrooms, many shutters are now water-resistant and are made with co-polymer coating, which means they can last a long time in moist conditions.

 

Check out our full height window shutters in Brighton by taking a look here.