Interior Skylight Covers & Blackout Shades

A skylight is the brightest window in the house, and it is the one you cannot simply pull a curtain across. In summer it can turn the room below into a hot spot, early sun through the ceiling can wake a whole bedroom, and a glare patch can follow you across a screen all afternoon. Many people search for an interior skylight cover because they want something that fits inside the opening and shuts the light out when needed, without hiring someone to work on the roof. This page is built around ZeroGlow, our framed blackout shade, made to the size of the skylight opening you measure.

ZeroGlow: a cover that fits inside the opening

ZeroGlow blackout shades are the product on this page. Each one is a 25 mm cellular shade held in an edge-to-edge frame, so the honeycomb fabric is enclosed on every side instead of hanging free from a headrail. The fabric is blackout and the shade is cordless. Unlike a fixed panel, it opens: you choose whether the shade travels up and down the glass or side to side, so you can uncover the skylight on a grey day and close it again when the sun comes round.

ZeroGlow is listed as energy efficient, worth weighing when the skylight sits over a room you use all day. The frame is finished with a rubber weather strip around its outside edges, which lets it sit snugly against the sides of the opening.

You pick the fabric from six colors, White, Black, Beige, Light Gray, Dark Gray and Straw, and the frame from three. A few design notes. On a white ceiling, White or Light Gray fabric in a matching frame lets the closed skylight read as part of the ceiling. Under wood beams or a stained ceiling, Straw or Beige sits more comfortably against the wood. In a media room or a bedroom used for daytime sleep, Black or Dark Gray makes the opening disappear once the lights are down. If you have several skylights in one room, use the same colors on each so the ceiling reads as one surface.

What to know before you order

ZeroGlow is built to your opening, and you can give your measurements in inches or millimeters. Because the frame presses into the opening rather than hanging from brackets, the size you send is the size the frame is made to, so measure carefully.

It is a cordless shade, so nothing hangs down from the ceiling. It is not motorized or remote controlled, so if a skylight is out of reach, plan how you will open and close it before you order. Covers that fit over the outside of a skylight on the roof are a different product and not something we make.

Installing ZeroGlow yourself

There is no drilling into the ceiling, the skylight frame or the trim. Installation takes three steps. First, lay the frame pieces on a soft, flat surface and join the corners. Second, apply the rubber weather strip around the outside edges of the assembled frame so it seals snugly against the opening. Third, position the frame inside the skylight opening and gently press the front of the frame into place.

Assemble the frame on the floor before you climb up, use a stable step ladder, and ask a second person to hand it to you when you are working overhead. Measure the inside of each opening at more than one point, and order one shade per skylight even if two look the same, since ceiling openings often differ slightly from one another.

A skylight should be something you enjoy, not something you work around. Choose your fabric and frame colors, send the size of each opening, and we will make every ZeroGlow shade to measure and ship it direct to your door.