Choosing Your Room
If possible, try to choose a room or area with good natural light to fill the space with warming sunshine. Easily make the windows private and diffuse the light with sheer curtains, honeycomb shades or natural bamboo roman shades which will help bring the feeling of nature in. Fabric Roman shades are also popular choices allowing for many textures and colors. Use a screen or drapery panels to separate this new space from another part of a quiet room if you can’t dedicate an entire room to your practice.

Choosing the Details
Colors can determine the mood and effect spaces have on us and should be chosen carefully. You will be ultimately the one spending time in your sanctuary and will want to make sure the colors you choose reflect your personality, likes and tastes. That last thing you’d want is to desire a calming retreat and paint it a bold red, (which has the tendency to evoke a raging response in people even if on a subtle level), and feel irritated or anxious in a place designed for harmony and relaxation. Soft blues, greens and neutrals like creams and brown tones are ideal for yoga rooms and meditation rooms.
Textures like basket weave fabrics and crewel designs as well as the look of bamboo shades on the windows influence the feel of this important room. Rattan chairs and natural bamboo rugs are great choices in a room like this.

Scents, candles and essential oils are important elements to a meditation relaxation area. A table to display pictures of meaning, books or candles will prove to be useful as well.

Clear the clutter and keep the space organized to prevent clutter from becoming overwhelming and ultimately distracting from your true purpose for the room. Store supplies, blankets, mats and cushions neatly in baskets, shelves and in cabinets.

Decorate! This space doesn’t have to be empty or boring to bring your focus inward; artwork which invokes relaxation or is meaningful to your practice will be a nice personal welcoming touch to your relaxation room and encourage its use.

Window Treatment ideas for yoga and meditation rooms.
Your meditation room can be a great place to use various window coverings and dressings. Drapery panels or sheers can frame windows from an aesthetic view and diffuse light when pulled closed while keeping the room insulated in cooler months. Other great solutions for your yoga and meditation space which are as beautiful as functional and insulating are roman shades, bamboo roman shades with lining and honeycomb/cellular shades. If privacy and insulation are not an issue you can use bamboo style shades without the liner which, during the day, still allows for an outside view when lowered.

Visit www.dantehill.com for more room ideas

Light control and glare reduction are important considerations, however most people want to maintain as much natural light as possible in the kitchen area. Finding this nice balance is easy depending on your needs. Privacy in the kitchen may not be top priority but if you can’t bear to wash the dishes in front of the window over the sink as sun beats in, it is time to think about a window covering. If your kitchen receives a lot of sun it can increase the temperature and turn your kitchen into an oven itself, again making it an uncomfortable place to be. Solar shades, horizontal blinds, honeycomb shades or roman shades and woven shades are all wonderful choices.

Window shades such as roman shades or woven shades provide privacy and light control when needed and look beautiful raised or lowered. Solar shades come down when needed and allow view through to the outdoors when down but reduces solar glare and heat penetrating into the room.

Horizontal Blinds, whether natural wood or vinyl, offer an added architectural effect. The white tones compliment kitchen cabinets and furniture; as do the beautifully stained wood or vinyl blinds. Adding decorative tapes, which hide the string ladders, presents another point of decoration.

Honeycomb shades offer a less expensive covering to kitchen windows, while providing light control and excellent insulating qualities. The cell sizes provide even more choices as do the great variety of colors. Another possibility is to choose the top down, bottom up feature which allows the shade to be lowered from the top only or raised up from the bottom only.

All these window shades and coverings can be topped by lovely fabric valances and/ or side panels. These make the kitchen homey and inviting.

Mixing wood and bamboo finishes can add layers of natural color and texture to any room or window. This is a nice technique to add depth and interest into small spaces and accentuating the positive elements in the room. The turned wooden legs on a coffee table, the cane backing on a chair, rattan elements on furniture or accessories and bamboo hardware on the windows all make an exquisite combination.

Adding other decorative elements to the room to complement and flow with this fabulous hardware option is easy. The Asian, Chinoisere or tropical Isle inspired rooms can take this type of hardware in another direction where it is equally well suited.

For the less formal areas, consider using textiles with a distinctive woven look and texture to bring the design concept home. For formal dining rooms and elegant parlors or bedrooms, silks and luxurious fabrics enhance this look as well.

The control options for the extended roman shade sizes are the same, standard cord lock and continuous cord loop control. We do highly recommend using the continuous cord loop control for the oversized shades over 96 inches wide and long. The loop controls have a heavy duty mechanism making the raising and lowering of oversized shades much easier. All of our linings are available as well for all of our premium roman shade styles. Still no shipping charges – that’s free! And, no additional oversized freight charges on window shades over 96 inches wide.

For help with measuring your windows for proper sizing, see our page for: Window Shade Measuring Instructions

ps: We will have our new drapery panel lengths and widths coming soon too!

Roman Shades
Roman shades are one of the most versatile and popular window coverings on the market, add that they can be very energy efficient and it is a top pick on our list of insulating window treatments. Roman shades are available in a number of different fabrics which can determine the amount of energy efficiency they provide. Dante Hill has an option to use a thermal liner with our roman shades increasing the insulating qualities and providing an additional barrier against the elements. Many of our customers love the roman shades because they function up and down like other window shades but can offer increased insulation and be a decorative statement for any room in your house. Roman shades come in several styles and are available with the top-down bottom-up option and a variety of lift controls. Some roman shade styles are available with the cordless operating feature which is wonderful on Patio or French doors.

Drapery Panels
Drapery panels have been a time tested and proven barrier against the elements. An excellent option for sliding doors and windows of any type, drapery panels are another decorative and versatile solution. Multiple header options like the Parisian Pleat, Back Tab and Grommet Styles to name a few, as well as several drapery lining options including our insulating favorite, the thermal lining, are available. Add a cornice board on top or some other type of valance and then you’ll be on your way to sealing up the house in style and saving your money for a rainy day!

Honeycomb/Cellular Shades
Honeycomb shades, also known as Cellular shades, are an excellent choice because they are designed to trap air in between the cells or honeycombs of the shade providing an insulating barrier minimizing the outside temperatures from entering through the window shade and into your home. Likewise, this insulating barrier is instrumental in preventing the warm air inside your home from escaping. The great thing about the honeycomb shades is they do the same thing in warmer weather by trapping the cool conditioned air inside and the heat of the day outside, again forming a barrier against the temperatures. This makes the honeycomb shade a great way to treat your windows all year round.

Our blog will be an exciting and inspirational resource for all interested in window treatments and interior design as well as a fun place to discover new ideas and how to apply them.  We encourage our readers to ask questions and offer suggestions on what they’d like to hear about.   We’ll discuss trends and timeless choices for window treatments and home decorating right from the source.  Our designers have applied experience and always love to talk about windows and interiors!