Plantation Shutters for Homes in Berkley, MA

Rooms with Light from Two Sides

Berkley’s lots are generous, and the houses on them are spaced out, so most rooms have windows on two walls rather than one. That sounds like a simple thing, but it changes what you ask of a window treatment. A room lit from the front and the side, or from the side and the back, gets sun at different times of day from different directions. Plantation shutters in Berkley, MA suit that well, because each window’s louvres can be set on their own while the shutters still look like a matched pair.

The houses themselves are a mix: capes and ranches, and newer colonials on the roads off Padelford Street and Myricks Street, with the Assonet Bay waterfront at the edge of town. A cape bedroom with a gable window and a dormer, a ranch living room with a front window and a side window, and a colonial family room with windows on three walls all come up regularly.

• Interior plantation shutters, made for inside the house
• Each window’s louvres set independently, morning to evening
• Louvre size and frame style matched across every window in a room

A Shutter for Each Kind of Berkley House

Cape

A gable window and a dormer in the same upstairs room, each with a shutter sized to its own opening and both in the same louvre.

Ranch

A broad front window and a smaller side window in the main room, panels that fold away on the big one, a single panel on the small one.

Newer colonial

Matching double-hung windows across two floors and around the corners, ordered as a set so every side of the house looks complete.

Why Two-Sided Rooms Change the Choice

In a room with one window, a shutter has one job at a time: open, closed or somewhere in between. In a Berkley room with windows on two walls, the two windows are rarely doing the same thing. In the morning, the east window may be full of sun while the north window is soft and even. By late afternoon, the west window is glaring and the east one is in shade.

With shutters, each window answers for itself. You can close the louvres on the sunny side, leave the shaded side wide open, and the room stays bright without anyone squinting. An hour later you change it round. Nothing has to be raised, lowered or drawn; you simply tilt the louvres on whichever window needs it.

Privacy works the same way. On a generous lot, a side window may face open ground while the front window looks toward the road. The front shutter can be tilted for privacy while the side one stays open to the view. In a bedroom, both are closed at night for a dark room, and both are opened in the morning.

The one thing that has to be shared is the look. Two windows in one room should read as a pair, so we give both the same slat width, the same frame profile and the same paint or stain, even though each frame is built to fit its own opening. That is how plantation shutters in Berkley, MA can behave differently on each wall and still make the room feel calm.

Plantation Shutters in Berkley, MA and the Way a House Faces

Which way each wall faces does more to shape a room than almost anything else, and with windows on two walls the effect doubles. When we plan plantation shutters in Berkley, MA, we ask which rooms catch the morning, which catch the evening and which stay cool all day, because it changes how the shutters will be used.

East-facing windows get bright, low sun first thing. In a bedroom, that is the window whose louvres need to close tightest. In a kitchen, it is welcome light at breakfast, with the louvres tilted up to keep it out of your eyes.

South-facing windows get sun for most of the day, high in summer and low in winter. Louvres tilted upward spread the light across the ceiling and keep it off a floor or a sofa.

West-facing windows take the late afternoon sun, often the harshest of the day. In a living room, that is the window you close at teatime while its neighbour on the next wall stays open.

North-facing windows give soft, even light and rarely need closing for the sun. Their shutters are mostly about privacy at night.

A two-sided room usually pairs two of these. Knowing which pair you have makes it easier to choose a louvre size, and it is why we would rather see the room than work from a list of sizes.

Rooms with screens

A home office or a family room with a television often sits in a two-sided room, and screens are where glare is most annoying. With shutters, you can close the window that throws light onto the screen and keep the other one open, so the room stays bright without the reflection.

The Corner Room

A corner room, with windows meeting near one corner, is common in Berkley colonials and ranches. It is often the brightest room in the house and the one people like most, but it is also the hardest to dress, because two treatments meet close together.

Shutters suit corner rooms because they are flat and tidy when closed and fold right back when open. The two frames can be planned so they sit evenly on each side of the corner, with the panels folding away from the corner rather than into it, so they do not clash when both are open. Where the windows are very close to the corner, we look at whether the panels should fold toward the middle of each wall instead. All of that is settled at the window, with a tape measure, during the measuring visit.

Furniture tends to gather in a corner room too: a reading chair in the angle, a desk under one window, a sofa along the other wall. Shutter panels swing into the room, so we note where those pieces sit and where the handles will fall, and if a panel would hit a chair back or a lamp, the width can be split into narrower panels that need less space to open.

Louvre Size for Berkley Windows

The louvre is the slat that tilts, and its size is one of the two main choices you make. A wider louvre has fewer slats in a panel. Tilted open, it shows more of the view and lets in more light. A narrower louvre has more slats, looks more traditional and suits a smaller window.

In a Berkley room with windows of two different sizes, say a broad ranch front window and a smaller side window, one louvre size has to suit both. A middle size often works best, open enough for the big window and fine enough for the small one. If the room looks out over the bay or a wide yard, you may lean toward a wider louvre for the view. In a cape bedroom with small windows under the roof, a narrower louvre keeps short panels in proportion.

There is a practical side as well. When the louvres open, they swing back toward the glass, so they have to clear any locks, cranks or handles. Our guide to plantation shutter louvre sizes covers this in more depth.

Frame Style: Inside the Opening or Around It

The frame carries the panels and is what actually attaches to the house. A frame recessed into the opening shows off the casing and gives a fitted look, but only where the window is set back far enough to take the frame with the louvres still able to rotate. A frame mounted on the surrounding wall or casing is the fix for a shallow recess; it also disguises worn trim and can make a small window seem bigger.

In a two-sided room, both windows usually take the same kind of frame so they match. If one window is deep enough for an inside frame and the other is not, we may suggest outside frames on both, so the pair looks the same. As for profile, a plain edge sits well in a ranch or a newer colonial, and a softly moulded one in a cape with traditional casings.

Assonet Bay at the Edge of Town

The houses near Assonet Bay add water to the picture. A room facing the bay gets light bouncing off the surface on top of the daylight from above, and on a sunny afternoon the glare can be considerable.

Shutters deal with it neatly. Slant the slats downward and both the sky and the reflection are screened, with the water still visible underneath. Slant them upward to throw the light onto the ceiling. On an overcast day, swing the panels open to the walls. A wider louvre is often the right choice in a bay-facing room, because fewer slats mean a clearer view through the open louvres.

In a waterfront house that also has windows on a second wall, the two-sided principle still applies. The bay window can be closed against the glare while the side window, facing the yard, stays open for light.

Capes off Padelford and Myricks Street

Berkley’s capes have most of their living space downstairs, with bedrooms upstairs under the roof. Downstairs, the windows are standard double-hung, often a front window and a side window in the living room. Upstairs, each bedroom may have a small gable-end window and a dormer, on two different walls, which makes for a two-sided room under a sloping ceiling.

Those upstairs windows are made for a shutter. A sloping ceiling leaves almost nothing above the window to hang a headrail from, but a shutter frame simply lines the opening. Give the dormer and the gable window the same slat, usually on the slim side so the short panels do not look heavy, and the room looks considered even though the two windows are nothing alike.

Ranches and Newer Colonials

A ranch has everything on one floor, usually with a living room window at the front, sometimes another on the side, and bedrooms each with a window or two. The broad front window takes several panels, hinged to fold away to the sides. Bedrooms take matching sets. Over the kitchen sink, a cafe-style shutter covering only the lower sash gives privacy at the counter and leaves the top open.

The newer colonials have larger rooms and more windows, often on two or three walls of the family room and the main bedroom. Ordering every window in a room as a set, and keeping the front of the house in one louvre and one finish, makes the house look complete from the road and calm inside.

Plantation Shutters in Berkley, MA, Step by Step

From the first phone call until the last panel is hung, you will hear from us at every stage, so nothing about plantation shutters in Berkley, MA comes as a surprise.

1. Contact the Swansea store by phone or the form, name the rooms and how many walls have windows, and we arrange your free quote.
2. A specialist measures every window in each room, along with the corners and the wall space beside each window for the panels to fold.
3. We talk through how each room is lit through the day and which windows face the road, the yard or the bay.
4. Slat width, frame profile and colour get chosen room by room, either at your kitchen table or with sample panels at the showroom.
5. Your quote itemises each window.
6. Production starts from the sizes we recorded.
7. Fitting day: frames go up, panels are hung and trued so both windows in a room shut evenly, and you get a quick lesson in tilting and folding.

Finishes and Pairing with Drapes

White, or something close to it, is the usual paint for capes, ranches and colonials alike, sitting with the trim and keeping rooms light. If your trim is not white, the paint can follow it.

Where a room has wood floors or furniture worth echoing, a stained shutter showing the grain is the other route. Fabric at the sides warms up a shuttered room, and in a two-sided room it can frame both windows alike. Window Works makes drapes too, so drapes for a Berkley room and the shutters can be planned together.

Cleaning

A regular flick with a duster keeps shutters looking right. Every so often, shut the slats, go down each panel with the soft brush on a vacuum, then open them the other way round and repeat. Paint can take a barely wet cloth for sticky marks; leave stained wood dry. Over many years a slat may loosen or a hinge may need attention, and the store can advise when that happens.

The Showroom in Swansea

It was 1988 when the family opened Window Works in Swansea, and the second generation has the keys now. Through over 37 years, its window treatment specialists have been out to capes, ranches and colonials in town after town between the SouthCoast and Rhode Island’s East Bay.

• Specialists used to awkward windows
• A visit to your house before anything is ordered
• Fitting by the store’s own people
• Contact kept up with you right to the end of the job
• Warranties on the products we sell

Stop by to swing a panel, flick the louvres, line up two slat widths and look at Norman shutters too.

Visit the showroom

The plantation shutters page goes through the range from the beginning, and Berkley window treatments gathers the blinds, shades and drapes we offer in town.

Get Your Free Quote

Getting a price costs nothing, because quotes are free. The call button connects you with Swansea, where we can pencil in a measuring visit to the house or answer questions about fitting. Writing suits some people better, and the form reaches us just the same. You are welcome to handle shutters at the showroom before any of that, with the way there shown on the contact page. On Google, Window Works is rated 5.0.