[2004JeepTJ]

Hello Jeepers,

I want buy blinds for my house and I am looking for advice. I checked out Blinds.com and also I am going to go to Home Depot to look at their stuff. Do you know of any other blinds sources with good prices?

Also, I measured the overall clearances for my windows....not necessarily the size of the glass panes, but the width of the window opening where the blinds would mount....anyway, If I measure the opening to be exactly 30", then do I want my blinds to be about a half inch less than that, so that there would be a quarter inch gap on each side of the blinds? I guess what I am looking for advice on is how much do I subtract from my overall window opening to determine which size blinds to install? If I measure the width of the opening to be 30", then do I order a blind that is 29.5" wide?

Any advice is appreciated, thank you for your help.

[ColoradoTJ]

We just got wood blinds for most of our house at JC Penny's for a fraction of what they cost at Home Depot and Lowes. They are comparable in quality, they are just limited in sizes.

[jeepsarecool]

As far as size, if you're going to buy it from a store, you'll just have to go with whatever will fit inside your window. Blind manufacturers know how wide standard windows are and make their blinds accordingly. I don't remember the most common sizes, but I think most of them will leave a little more than 1/4" of space on each side, but they still look fine.

And where to get them........... if you just want plain plastic blinds, the cheapest place I found was actually Wal-Mart.

[jzmtl]

The home depot here will cut any blinds you buy to desired length on the spot, I'd make it 1/8" inch shorter than the window frame, or just the same length, because I HATE blinds that's not wide enough and light come through from the sides. The metal channel may ends up a little wide to fit into bracket but there's always angle grinder.

[JeepHunter89]

Get a dark blue sheet. Trust me...it's awesome.

[Shameless Elmer]

Like a previous poster said, windows and blinds are made in standard sizes. You'll know when you get to the store and see the sizes available. As for the 1/4" gap, that may be a bit too small. You likely have 1/2" of window frame on each side of the window. If the window frame isn't perfectly square, and it probably isn't, the blind will likely drag on one side of the frame if you attempt to fit blinds with only1/4" gap. Standard widths have always worked for me. You might have to shorten them though. It's pretty simple to do.

[Rule303]

Don't do like I did and buy expensive wood ones if you have small kids. Every dang one was broken within a year. Replaced them with $5 vinyl ones that look fine. Now the cat has broken most of them!

[2004JeepTJ]

Thanks for all the advice everyone. It sounds like i want to subtract 1/2" from my overall width when ordering the blinds, so that I'll have 1/4" gap on either side. I think I will go for the faux wood blinds. I saw another site selectblinds.com and I am going to give them a look.

Thanks again.

[hoosier724]

never heard of Standard size windows?

[grogie]

My wife and I put in new blinds last month. We went with 2" white, wood blinds. As far as who did them... we called around to custom blind shops and received estimates. Sure you can do it yourself or use Lowes, but the custom shops came out and did the measurements, showed us all the options, gave good advice for our windows, did all the install, and put in nice wood cases to hide the mechanics at the top. I would suggest that you at least check with custom shops, even if you don't use them. Keep in mind that if you do the measurements and their off, it's your problem. Our blinds showed up in about ten days, and the install was done for 17 windows in under two hours. We've been very happy, and the neighbors even notice.

No offense to using JC Penny btw, as we did look there, but we thought the companies that do blinds professionally had better service and nicer blinds to pick from.

[hoosier724]

my wife and I did 2" wood blinds from Lowes last year in our livingroom ( 4 windows ), not a big job. Be sure to get all metal workings, not that plastic stuff.

[SteelBlueTJ]

Just buy the cheap white vynle ones at wal-mart for like $5. Easy to clean and look good. And they are cheap enough to throw away if they break from kids or whatever. If you have larger windows then get the same thing in a slightly bigger size at Lowes or Home Depot and have them cut it down in the store.

[The Mean Fish]

3 houses so far... couldn't be happier. The prices were great and they're fast. It doesn't take a lot of time to measure and the install is nothing with a good drill.

http://www.justblinds.com/

[The Mean Fish]

Originally Posted by 2004JeepTJ

Thanks for all the advice everyone. It sounds like i want to subtract 1/2" from my overall width when ordering the blinds, so that I'll have 1/4" gap on either side. I think I will go for the faux wood blinds. I saw another site selectblinds.com and I am going to give them a look.

Thanks again.

Make sure you read on the site before you do that, on http://www.justblinds.com/ they take into accout for that space. They want exact measurements, they'll subtract a little from each side.

[The Mean Fish]

Read this

http://www.justblinds.com/static/justblinds_measuring.pdf

All of mine were mounted inside so they want exact measurements, if you're ordering blinds that mount on the outside of the frame I guess they make exactly what you order without taking a little off.