5 Things to Consider when Designing a Conservatory or Sunroom

When it comes to designing sunrooms or conservatories there are always plenty of experts around to give advice on what you should do and not do, often this is not advice but more an opinion on what they like and they would do, unless of course they are qualified in the subject. But ask yourself are you building a room for your friends and their preferences or are you building a room to solve your space/light issues? My experience over the past 25 years is that people can get very stressed over the design and they try to please everyone when really there are just some key basics that need to be addressed and once done the the rest will fall into place. So here is my take on what you need to consider before starting the design process for your conservatory or sunroom.

5 Things to Consider when Designing a Conservatory or Sunroom

1.Space
What space do you NEED, not what size will FIT your home. There is no point in building a conservatory, Orangery or Sunroom and then realising that the room does not serve the purpose it was built for – maybe the perfect suite of furniture won’t fit or maybe the dining table and the suite won’t fit together so you can’t enjoy breakfast on the sunny mornings. There are plenty of options available to make space for your new room and this is where the experts come in. We can move windows and doors on the house, move boilers, move pipes, move sheds, move decks, basically we can reconfigure what needs to be done to make sure that your conservatory or sunroom is the correct size.

2. Lighting
Consider the light in your home first and then your new room. If your home is already dark then by adding a new sunroom it will most definitely be darker, so you may want to consider putting in a glass roof. Remember that there is no point in adding a new room and at the same time losing a room internally in a house which becomes too dark. We will check the direction your home faces and any obstacles to the light which the conservatory may create and then work our design around this. There are plenty of clever ways to deal with this, for example by increasing the width and reducing the depth into the garden, it may be possible to allow more light back into the house.

3. Door Positioning
Carefully think where you should position the doors, wherever there are doors there can’t be seating, crucial if you have a nice view but can’t position your chair to enjoy it as it is in the way of the doors. Doors should lead toward your outdoor space and be practical – in other words you don’t make the journey to the clothesline a marathon.

4. Don’t Forget Your House!
Design your sunroom while also designing your home. Don’t make the mistake of creating a beautiful new conservatory or sunroom but in doing so leaving your home out of proportion with its surrounding. Remember that the appearance of your home is going to change once a conservatory or sunroom is built, proportions of wall/windows/doors are going to change, your outdoor areas and paths will also change and so you may also need to consider changing or redesigning your patio/deck/Rockery.

5. Be Sensible and Realistic
Be sensible with your expectations, if you live in a normal city semidetached home then don’t waste your time clipping photos of conservatories and orangeries from the glossy home magazines taken at stately homes in England. You could build a replica but it might look a little out of place in your humble abode. Be practical with your sunroom or conservatory concept, if have a fairly basic looking house then build your new conservatory or sunroom reflecting or enhancing this instead of trying to make it look something its not.

5 Things to Consider when Designing a Conservatory or Sunroom

So there you have the 5 key things to consider when designing a conservatory or sunroom. We’ve been building conservatories for a long time now and all of the above is second nature to us so hopefully you’ll find it useful.

At Conservatory Designs we like to take the hassle out of designing Conservatories, Sunrooms and Orangeries – designs is in our name and that is what we have being doing for the last 26 years. The service is free of charge and we use the most up to date design software to ensure the best result. For more information please contact us online or give our office a call on 045 844002.