When purchasing motorized window coverings for your Reno or Lake Tahoe home, there are many factors to consider. Should I use batteries? Should I use a hard-wired configuration? Should I have an internet based app to function them? Should I…?
Your answers are based on your home and your actual needs. Let me tell you the story of this job and how we decided to make the choices we did. This is the second home of the client in a Lake Tahoe location. They do a Ski-Lease for half of the year and they use it personally during the other 7 months of the year. They wanted fool proof window treatments. The primary function of this job was diffusing the direct sunlight that was hitting the television screen in the morning. To accomplish this goal, we used a double cell shade, the Applause Honeycomb Shades by Hunter Douglas. They still allow a lot of light in, but the direct sunlight that was hitting the television was removed. We chose to cover all 4 windows with one shade to simplify the process and to save money. Had we covered all 4 shades individually, the motorization charges would have raised the costs significantly. As far as the way that they work, we had two different issues.
- Simple to use- Because they had renters, they needed something really easy to use. As a result, we chose the SimpleLift system from Hunter Douglas. This product was covered in a previous blog posting.
- Able to be worked from the ground floor- As you can see in the video, the shade was on the second floor making lifting and lowering difficult, especially for a renter who would be unfamiliar with the product. We chose the Hunter Douglas PowerView motorization system. These motorized window coverings are backed up by the addition of a plug-in power source which alleviates the need to ever change batteries.
The PowerView system has a 5 year warrantee, so they are assured of simple and efficient function of their window shades for a long time. My experience with Hunter Douglas motors is that their warrantees are under-promised. They have lasted for much longer than the warrantee period. Many clients see lifetimes well over 10 years.
Large shades are easy to lift with motors.