Measuring and installing new blinds, shutters, and shades for your home or office can come with extra hurdles that might pose tricky problems for the inexperienced interior decorator. Setting up a whole new window treatment isn’t as simple as buying furniture, laying down a rug, or painting the walls. So for all you would-be do-it-yourselfers, remember the following bits of measuring advice before investing a great deal of money or time into a new project. Once you’ve got accurate measurements, you can pass them along to a blind expert here at Affordable Blinds and we can get thing cut and ready to be installed.
For blinds:
1) When mounting blinds, you need to determine whether you’d like to mount them from the inside or the outside of your window frame. An outside mount will cover the molding around the window, and an inside will fit within. Either way is fine—you just need to be comfortable with one or the other.
2) You’ll need to make measurements using a steel measuring tape, and you’ll need to record six separate measurements—three each for height and width. Starting with the horizontal, measure the width at the top, middle, and bottom of the sill. When measuring the vertical, do so from the right-most, centre, and left-most points of the sill.
3) When measuring your window frame for height (vertical), always round up to the nearest 1/8th inch. While measuring for width (horizontal), always round down. Don’t get this distinction confused!
4) If you’re going for an inside mount, use the smallest of your three measurements for the width, and the largest for the height (if there are smallest and largest among them, that is). If you would prefer that the bottom of your blinds not touch the sill, take off an inch of the bottom.
5) If it’s an outside mount you’re going for, take the same three horizontal and three vertical measurements as before. Having the blinds or shade be flush with the frame or extend beyond by a couple of inches is your call. Go by the longest of each measurement for height and width. However, add three or four more inches to the height to make room for the mounting parts (headrail), which will be installed over the window.
For shades:
1) Only make one measurement for height and one measurement for width, but add about 3 inches at the bottom and 4 inches on the side to allow for an overlap for maximum coverage.
2) Make room for carpeting if it should go right down to the floor.
3) Be aware of heaters along the wall—make sure your shades are a foot above them and at least 7 inches from the sides.
Remember, this is just to get you started. There are a few more things to be aware of while choosing the right kind of coverings for your window shapes, and then there are other relevant reminders involving the actual installations. If at any time you’d rather have our professional blind, shutter, and shade installers handle the measuring and installation process, we’d be more than happy to lend a helping hand! All you have to do is send us a message and we can get started picking out the best colours, designs, shapes, and sizes for your (suddenly very trendy) home!