Sorting generations of family photos recently, a friend remarked how many of those memorable times with family and loved ones took place in outdoor living areas. On the porch with neighbors, on the patio with friends, more family fun in every form imaginable taking place in the backyard. Children who now have children of their own are captured in the warmth of days gone by, cavorting in the spray of a lawn sprinkler, and living ancestors gaze toward the camera wisely, lined up for posterity, posing for a photo with the backdrop of the garage. Outdoor living areas draw us to them, and they draw out what we love about life.
The Many Languages of Connection
The variety of architectural styles that place emphasis on outdoor living areas is already vast, and those styles continue to grow and evolve, because the value we place on outdoor living areas is never diminished.
Even ornate Victorian homes, whose interiors were lavishly draped with curtains and cluttered with memorabilia, featured wrap-around porches and gazebos for full immersion in nature. In the next generation, craftsman-style homes and bungalows made a point of bringing the outdoors in and inviting folks to step outside at every opportunity. Curtains came down and windows became picture-frames for the great outdoors. Bungalow porches often extended the whole width of the home and served as a real extension of the living room, even to the point of seeing oriental rugs outside in period photos. Pass-throughs from kitchen to patio show us that serving meals in outdoor living areas was part of the arts-and-crafts ideal for living.
In the mid-20th century, modern architecture made it even easier to enjoy outdoor living areas and, in fact, any barriers between indoor and outdoor were minimized – even dematerialized – where the climate permitted. Modern materials and breakthroughs in the durability and versatility of glass led to designs that invited people continually to see themselves outdoors, even from perspectives inside the home.
The design solutions for enjoying outdoor living areas have a long heritage and offer a full array of solutions for the home today.
When Your Dream Kitchen is Outdoors
The good fortune that comes with our climate includes an opportunity to make the pleasures of a cookout something you can choose any day you like. There’s rarely a week, and never a month, when it’s not possible to prepare a meal in the great outdoors. As a result, coastal Carolina homes often go far beyond the diversion of an outdoor grill.
Outdoor entertaining is not just for guests, too. Your outdoor dream space can be the scene of any meal, any day of the week. We happily design fully equipped outdoor kitchens, with outdoor heaters for those rare off-season evenings that come with a chill, and even with full home-entertainment systems for spending the entire evenings in your outdoor living space, whenever you desire.
Shade and Shelter at Your Fingertips
What’s overhead can make the difference, in outdoor living areas, between a spot you like to visit, and a place you never want to leave. Our experience and design portfolio includes motorized pergolas, power-regulated screens, and power shades. With these options, what you love about being outdoors can be yours without compromising on the comforts of home.
Pergolas are an elegantly simple design solution for reducing the intensity of the outdoor sun without shutting it off completely. In their original form, vertical planks created patterns of shade that progressed as the sun moved across the sky. Today you don’t have to wait for the sun; that initiative is yours. Motorized pergolas enable you to control the slant of the slats with your fingertips, specifying the degree of sun or shade you desire, anytime.
Motorized screens make protection from insects and the elements a comfort you can depend on in your outdoor living areas. Privacy, too, can be designed to your own preferences, with a variety of materials and fabrics available.
A Joy Today and a Value Tomorrow
Enhancing the enjoyment of your home’s outdoor living areas is not only something you can enjoy now, but also something you can feel good about when it comes to the value of your home. As personal as your outdoor dream space can be, with all the design options available, it still becomes a feature that increases the usable living space of your home and adds value to it, because outdoor living spaces are considered so desirable by so many people.
Connecting your desires with the possibilities that fine design can offer is our passion and our pursuit. Let’s talk about the possibilities for adding an outdoor dream space to your home. We look forward to getting together.
