Silver backed fabrics change the whole game when it comes to fabric color and performance for your roller shade.

Non-silver backed solar screen fabrics have some predictable performance characteristics- if you look at the chart below, you’ll see that typical light colored screens perform well at keeping a room cooler, with a lower shading coefficient overall, but they also fall to the right on the graph with a higher Visible Light Transmission.

Conventional solar screen fabrics in darker colors fall  far to the left, with very low VLT values, meaning that they reduce glare very well, but they also fall in the upper portion of the graph, showing higher shading coefficient values.

So what does this mean in plain English?  Well, darker shades are easier to see through - i.e. better visibility but are hotter because their color absorbs heat which gets transmitted inside your space.  Lighter shades are harder to see through - i.e. less visibility because the light will "glow" when it strikes the lighter fabrics which obscures the view.  However, the lighter color does not absorb heat as much, so less heat is transmitted into your space.

Here is the good news.  By using some sort of space age silver technology, these silver backed marvels allow for dark fabric which preserves view and then magically the heat gain is reduced by the silver on the back - which does not create a glow problem.  Again, if you can understand it, check out the silver fabrics on the chart below.

Or said more technically, "notice that all of the colors of both SilverScreen and EnviroScreen high performance fabrics fall into what we call the “silver sweet spot”… low on the Shading Coefficient axis and low on the Visible Light Transmission axis. Every color! Excellent performance in both areas (all three really, if you consider view-through a separate value). No compromise necessary. This is all due to the ultra-fine, reflective layer of silver backing on the solar fabric, which reflects away heat and light, allowing the interior to stay cool, glare free and maintain a great view and connection to the outdoors."

Occasionally, shutters are mounted inside a window frame.  One method is to mount the shutters with a hanging strip on the side using a standard non-mortised hinge. The manufacturer generally provides a hanging strip for both sides and a light block for the top and the bottom. For each panel, two magnets and a regular hinge should be included. (Usually, the hinges are attached to the panel at the factory, however hanging strips, light blocks, and magnets come and are installed separately)

The diagram below will help you visualize how this shutter application will mount to your window opening.

The pictures above are from a roller shade project for a Weinerschnitzel restaurant.  The East facing windows (4ea) had really old roller shades which were completely unusable and made the restaurant look old. The West facing window (1ea) was completely uncovered and as such the customers and employees were brutalized by the sun every afternoon.  The West facing window shown directly on the main order counter for the restaurant.

As you can imagine, this was an untenable situation.  However, after replacing the East facing windows with a simple cream colored solar roller fabric with a matching facscia and likewise covering the West window with the same type of roller fabric and fascia, we saw a transformation of their space.

The restaurant now looks newer, cleaner, and is far more comfortable for customer and employees.  It was a real pleasure to be part of a relatively simple, yet profound, transformation of this standby food establishment.

We would love to help you find the right roller shade for your restaurant application. Contact us today for a complimentary consultation and thanks for your interest in Latreia Blinds and Shutters!