Best Window Treatments for Living Rooms

When you think about your living room, what comes to mind? Warm, fresh, homey? Whether you host a Tuesday night book club or a Saturday morning brunch, the living room plays a huge part in your life at home. It’s important that this space functions the way you want it to, so you can enjoy it fully.

The best living room window treatments bring together light control, privacy, comfort and style. They can soften bright sunlight, reduce glare, protect your furnishings from UV exposure and provide privacy when you need it—all while complementing the way your family uses the room. Ready to dive into some of our favourite ways to make your living room even better? Spoiler alert…it involves the windows.

What Should You Consider for Living Room Windows?

Everyone faces some head-scratching questions when they’re upgrading a space. Should you rearrange the layout? How will you create that perfect, warm, glowy ambiance? What kind of shade can cover that awkwardly placed window? Bringing your challenges up early in the process of choosing window treatments for your living room is critical.

We guide our clients through every single one of those questions. It’s not necessarily the “fun” part, but it sets you up for success when you’re ready to bring in those creative elements.

Some of the common functional questions we ask are:

• How much natural light does the room receive throughout the day?
• Does direct sunlight create glare on a television or other screens?
• Is daytime or nighttime privacy a concern?
• Does the room become too warm or experience significant UV exposure?
• Are there large, tall or hard-to-reach windows?
• Are windows and patio doors located in the same space?

The direction your windows face can also affect the amount and intensity of sunlight entering the room. A west-facing living room, for example, may need more afternoon glare and heat control, while a north-facing space may benefit from treatments that make the most of softer natural light. Learn more about how window direction affects natural light before deciding which features are most important for your space.

Best Shades for Living Rooms

A living room is a place for family and friends. The multi-purpose nature of the space means it needs to function in different situations. Curating an environment that feels inviting, comfortable and relaxed is key. Fortunately, there isn’t one “best” shade for every living room. The right choice depends on how you use the space and what you need from your windows.

Sheer Shades

If you love your view and natural light, sheer shades can create that perfect, warm glow while giving you more control over brightness and privacy. Pirouette® Shades and Silhouette® Window Shadings diffuse harsh sunlight while maintaining a connection with the outdoors. Adjustable fabric vanes let you change the amount of light and privacy throughout the day. Sheer shades are especially well suited to living rooms where preserving the view is just as important as controlling the sunlight.

Roller & Solar Shades

For a clean, streamlined look, roller shades offer a wide selection of fabrics, colours and opacity levels. They can provide anything from softly filtered daylight to increased privacy and room darkening, depending on the fabric you choose.

Solar shades are particularly useful for bright living rooms where glare, UV exposure or heat gain is a concern. They can reduce the intensity of incoming sunlight while preserving the outdoor view, making them a practical choice for living rooms with significant sun exposure.

Roman Shades

Roman shades bring softness and dimension to a living room while maintaining the function of a shade. Vignette® Modern Roman Shades offer the tailored appearance of fabric folds without exposed rear cords, creating a polished look that works beautifully in both contemporary and traditional spaces.

Honeycomb Shades

If comfort and energy efficiency are priorities, cellular shades can be an excellent choice. Their honeycomb construction traps air at the window to help reduce heat transfer, which is especially valuable through Ontario’s warm summers and cold winters. They’re a good option for living rooms with large expanses of glass or windows that tend to make the room feel too hot or cold.

Woven Wood Shades

For homeowners who want to introduce natural texture, woven wood shades can add warmth and character to a living room. Made with materials such as grasses, reeds and woods, they create visual interest on their own or can be layered with drapery for an even more finished look.

Layer Living Room Shades with Custom Drapery

One of the first rooms in your home that can create a “wow-factor” moment is your living room. The moment you walk in, you’re impacted by the lighting, mood and feel of the space. Windows give you an opportunity to create a backdrop for the entire room.

Pairing shades with custom drapery can bring the whole look together. Shades handle everyday light control and privacy, while drapery adds softness, colour, pattern and height. Drapery panels can also frame a beautiful outdoor view and provide another layer of privacy or light control when needed. The two treatments don’t have to compete for attention. You might combine a subtly textured shade with patterned drapery or keep everything neutral for a soft, sophisticated look. See more ideas for pairing shades with drapery throughout your home.

Window Treatments for Large Living Room Windows

Large windows can be one of the most beautiful features of a living room. They invite natural light into the space, showcase the landscape and create the open, airy feeling homeowners love. But all that glass can also mean more glare, UV exposure, heat gain and nighttime privacy concerns.

When choosing window treatments for large windows, consider how much of the view you want to preserve, how frequently the shades will be adjusted and how intense the sunlight becomes throughout the day. The size and weight of the window treatment also matter. A solution that is easy to operate on a standard window may need a different operating system when covering a much larger expanse of glass.

The goal isn’t to hide those beautiful windows. It’s to give you control over them so you can enjoy the view and natural light when you want them and create a more comfortable, private atmosphere when you don’t.

Coordinating Living Room Windows & Patio Doors

With more open floor plans in homes, having doors and windows in the same space is relatively common. We often work with clients who have windows alongside sliding glass or patio doors in a living room. Coming up with a game plan to cover both while maintaining a cohesive look does not have to be a struggle.

You may find that matching fabrics and styles on both your windows and doors is what you love. Or, you may prefer complementary treatments designed specifically for the way each opening functions. Horizontal shades on windows and vertical treatments on doors can coordinate beautifully when they share similar fabrics, colours or textures.

Luminette® Privacy Sheers, for example, offer soft vertical fabric vanes that work beautifully across sliding and patio doors, while coordinating horizontal sheer shades can cover nearby windows. Explore more ideas for window treatments for sliding and patio doors when your living room includes both types of openings.

Flexible Light Control from Day to Night

A living room can come with its own special list of needs. Similar to how we understand the challenges of the windows, we encourage you to think about how you most enjoy using the space. Maybe you use it more in the evenings for winding down and family game nights. Or, for you, it might be an early morning play zone for little kiddos and pets.

For plenty of options no matter where the day takes you, dual shades can be the ticket. Two fabrics on one window provide a wide range of control. You can soften incoming light with a light-filtering fabric during the day, then lower a secondary room-darkening shade when you want greater privacy or a darker atmosphere at night.

If television glare or intense sunlight is the primary problem, you may not need complete darkness. Choosing the right opacity lets you balance natural light, the view and screen comfort based on how you actually use your living room.

Motorized Living Room Shades

We know smart homes are one of the best things to happen for the modern homeowner. With voice activation, app control or a single tap, you can control your shades—no headache required. Set the tone in your living room by moving your shades to the ideal position throughout the day.

Have high or difficult-to-reach windows? Not a problem with motorized window treatments. Automation is also helpful for living rooms with several windows or changing sun exposure. Instead of walking from window to window as glare moves across the room, shades can be adjusted together or scheduled to move at different times of day. That makes it easier to enjoy morning sunlight, reduce afternoon glare, create evening privacy and protect your interiors from prolonged UV exposure—all without constantly thinking about your window coverings.

Find the Right Window Treatments for Your Living Room

Your living room should be a retreat from the day and surround you with the atmosphere and style you’re dreaming of. The right solution will depend on your windows, the direction of the sunlight, the way your family uses the room and the balance of privacy, light control and comfort you want to achieve. Our team at Custom Shades of London can help you compare fabrics, styles, operating systems and features to find the best living room window treatments for your home. Book a consultation with our team to get started on your living room in London, Ontario and the surrounding area.