Large Window Shades & Blinds

Large windows are often the reason you love a room and the reason it is hard to live in. A wide living room window or a wall of glass brings in plenty of daylight, but it also throws glare across screens, heats the room in the afternoon, loses heat at night and puts the whole room on view once the lights come on. Width is what makes them hard to cover, since stock blinds stop well short of big openings and the heavier the fabric, the narrower it tends to be made. Every shade here is made to the size you measure and shipped direct to you.

Which shades and blinds suit a large window

Cellular shades cover the widest openings as a single shade. On a bead chain, light filtering and blackout cellular at the 38 mm cell size reach 197 inches wide and 157 inches high, wider than anything else we build. The cell structure also holds a layer of air against the glass.

Roller shades give the cleanest look. Light filtering roller suits a living room window you want screened without darkening, and blackout roller suits a large bedroom window. Solar shades are the choice where the view is the point. They are sold by openness at 1, 3, 5 and 10 percent, blocking roughly 80, 70, 60 and 50 percent of light, so you cut the glare and still see out. Woven wood adds natural texture across a big expanse of glass, with an optional light filtering or blackout liner.

Width limits, and how to go past them

Light filtering roller reaches 96 inches wide on our smaller cassettes and 98 3/8 inches on the standard squared cassette, while blackout and sunscreen goods stop at 86 or 94 1/2 inches on the same hardware, because the heavier fabrics are milled on narrower rolls. If a fabric roll is narrower than the system allows, the fabric becomes the limit: two of our series run on rolls of about 90 inches and cannot fill a 96 inch opening on any cassette. Any roller shade over 100 inches high moves to the 43 mm tube and the large cassette, which reaches 118 inches wide and 120 inches high.

Past a single shade, split the window. Woven wood maxes at 96 inches wide on every lift system, but several shades can share one headrail to 118 inches total, though a common valance still stops at 96 inches. Roller shades can be built two on one headrail on our smaller cassettes, either working independently or driven together by one clutch or motor so they stay in step. Cordless is not available on the shared drive version, since one spring cannot drive two panels.

The lift system matters more as shades grow. Cordless cellular caps at 94 inches wide and 94 inches high, and motorized cellular at 38 mm reaches 126 inches wide but only 79 inches high. A motor is worth considering on any large shade you raise every day: the Matter motor connects directly to Apple Home, and the Zigbee motor reaches five specific Echo devices without a hub.

Measuring and installing a large window yourself

Measure the width at the top, middle and bottom, since a wide opening is the one most likely to be out of square, and use the smallest figure rounded down to the nearest 1/8 inch. For an inside mount the shade is built about 1/4 inch narrower than the opening. For an outside mount, add about 3 7/8 inches to width and height so the shade overlaps the frame and closes the light gap.

Fitting needs a 6 mm drill bit, with screw holes marked at 1.1 inch spacing and two anchor types supplied for drywall or masonry. Each bracket has four pre-drilled holes, and a wide, heavy shade should use all four. Hook the valance groove onto the bracket latch, press back until it clicks, and confirm the top and rear have both locked.

On a big window a sample tells you more than a photo, so hold it against the glass at the brightest time of day before you settle on an openness or a liner.