Custom FlexShades at Marigny Dialysis, New Orleans. Photo courtesy Budget Blinds of New Orleans
Here’s a great story from Teri Boxell. Teri is an inside salesperson here who focuses on serving our Budget Blinds accounts.
Jeff Anderson and Jimmy Corkern from Budget Blinds of New Orleans approached Draper with a solar control question. Their client, a dialysis facility, needed privacy for their clients, but wanted to offer the health benefits of natural light as well.
The challenge: Managing light so sunlight can be blocked and filtered at the same time?
Draper responded with a unique and attractive solution. Phifer’s SW7000 opaque fabric covers the bottom half of their windows, and is seamed to Phifer SheerWeave SW2000 basketweave solar fabric with 5% openness for the upper half. The SW7000 fabric gives complete privacy, while the SW2000 lets in plenty of light at the top of the windows. The challenge was met.
As an added bonus, these shades reflect light and heat from the sun, reducing the amount of energy required to cool the building—an important benefit in sun-drenched New Orleans!
More and more customers are expressing the need, like the dialysis center in New Orleans, to maintain privacy while letting in the daylight. We actually have more ways to address this concern.
The Bottom-Up FlexShade line is a new product that we launched last fall. It can be made with an opaque fabric to provide privacy in the lower part of the window while letting the light in through the upper window. Or with a mesh fabric, the Bottom-Up FlexShade lets a person sitting next to the window have protection from heat gain and glare while much of the light penetrates further into the room, reaching others seated farther away.
The FlexWave Light Shelf is also new, and offers another option. The FlexWave is mounted in the upper part of the window and bounces daylight off its reflective surface to send it far into the room. Below the FlexWave, you can install either a conventional top-down roller shade or the Bottom-Up FlexShade. In either case, if the shade below the FlexWave Light Shelf is made with opaque fabric, you’ll have lots of daylight paired with all the privacy you need.
The sales team at Draper is trained to help you manage the light from your windows–whether your biggest concern is privacy, heat, or glare. Call us when we can help!
