Natural Lighting

 Natural light in a room can be a truly wonderful thing, especially if there is just enough light, of the right intensity and coming in at a good angle - it is far better for your eyes and mood than artificial lighting. But what can we do when we have too much light, or the light is too intense? From the 1960s to the 1990s, there was a tendency for rooms to be designed with floor-to-ceiling glazing, often for the full width of one wall. While this can be pleasant in winter, it can be quite oppressive for the rest of the year, and undesirable if you are a shift-worker or like to lie in on the weekend.

Fortunately, the solutions can be relatively simple and inexpensive if the problem is to reduce the amount of light entering a room. If you need to block out the light completely, there is an excellent selection of blackout fabric that can be used for curtains or blinds, or you can buy ready-made ones. You will see in my photo that the daylight is still 'leaking' on the sides and along the top - if you need the maximum blackout during the day, you may need to have the curtains much wider than the window, and have a pelmet to close off at the top. 

Blackout curtain

If you just want to reduce the amount of light entering the room, or you want to cut down the glare, you can use a translucent fabric - most lightweight fabrics such as cotton or calico work well, and there is a large selection of mesh and netting. Choose the colour carefully for the best effect - white and pale colours will still let in considerable light, but more filtered, where as mid-tone colours will block more of the light. Very intense or dark tones will generally block out too much of the light if you use it across the entire surface of the glazing, but can be effective in narrower panels. 

In the room in my photo below, the window is 2.5m wide on a north aspect, so the daylight can be very intense especially in spring and autumn when the sun angle is still quite low, letting the direct rays of the sunlight deep into the room. I developed the idea of a large central blind flanked by two narrow ones to match the window design when I was decorating a room for a small baby. This way, one can have many variations to match the needs of the baby's sleeping routine, but it works equally well for other rooms. Here I have the side blinds raised, to allow for maximum ventilation, while the central canvas blind filters the light bathing the central part of the room.

 

Three panels of Roman blinds for maximum variation

I am a fan of Roman blinds, because they are simple to make and have a sturdy mechanism, but roller blinds are a good alternative. I am not really in favour of Venetian blinds, as they can be quite a dust trap and the newer ones are made of very lightweight materials that can easily bend out of shape.

The other problem with large areas of glazing is privacy - if your window is overlooked by your neighbours, you may be seeking a solution that blocks the view from outside, but still allows in the sunlight. One of the oldest solutions is textured or 'obscure glass - the glazing onto the access corridor to my apartment dates from the 1930s, which has fortunately lasted unscathed, as it would be impossible to match if there was a breakage.

Obscure glass to a bathroom

As you can see in the photo, the view is distorted, but plenty of light still comes in. You can get a similar effect using one-way tinted glass, but be careful of this for a bathroom, as the 'one-way' is in the direction of the side with more light, so at night with the light on, the person in the bathroom will be clearly visible from outside!

Another option, although this will reduce the amount of light entering the room, is to use coloured or stained glass. In a future blog I will be exploring this entrancing art form, specifically the work of the talented and versatile Elizabeth Beard.