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How to Choose the Right Sunroom Furniture for You and Your Home

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Introduction

Sunrooms are one of the best luxuries you can indulge in. Whether you build a three-season sunroom or a solarium, it’s important to choose the right furniture for those rooms. If you have broken furniture that needs to be fixed, you can search for “furniture repair near me” and hire professionals fit for the job. For now, let’s check out how you can choose the right sunroom furniture for you and your home. 

The Choices

  1. Prepared for the Elements – Since sunrooms are enclosed structures, people think that they can simply place indoor furniture inside them. However, you’ll be up for a nasty surprise if you place furniture that’s designed for indoor use in a sunroom. As the name suggests, sunrooms are designed to allow in plenty of sunlight. That means your furniture is also going to be exposed to several hours of both direct and indirect sunlight. 

If the furniture is not designed for outdoor use and isn’t made to tolerate the harsh UV rays of the sun, then it would get damaged or degraded very easily. This is especially true for the upholstery, wooden parts, and paint on metal or vinyl surfaces. Fabric that is not designed for outdoor use will fade quickly. If the furniture is designed for shaded use, then you wouldn’t be able to claim a warranty when it inevitably gets damaged in the sunroom. Before you buy furniture for the sunroom, make sure that it’s rated for outdoor use and has some sort of guarantee for the same from the manufacturer.  

  1. Size – The number and type of furniture pieces that can be added to the sunroom depend on its size. You need to get a measuring tape and record all the dimensions of the sunroom. Take those dimensions or preferably a blueprint of the sunroom to the furniture store. Experienced furniture store employees would be able to guide you about the number of chairs, coffee tables, and sofas that can fit inside your sunroom. 

If you’re shopping for furniture online, check the dimensions of the furniture pieces. This gives you a rough idea about the pieces that can comfortably fit inside the sunroom. While calculating the number of pieces that can fit inside the sunroom, it’s also important to add at least a foot or two on each side of the furniture piece so that there’s enough room for free movement.

  1. Comfort – Relaxing within the close embrace of nature doesn’t mean you have to do it with discomfort. Instead, pay extra attention to cushions while buying sunroom furniture. Make sure that they are thick, use quality foam and provide ample support for several hours. People use the sunroom for recreational activities. They use it for relaxing, meditating, reading a book, and other such activities that make them calm. 

If the seat sinks down and hurts you, that distraction isn’t going to let you enjoy your precious time in the embrace of nature. You can also swap out the existing cushions on your furniture with those that are made from multi-layered memory foam. Nature seems even better when you have the feeling of sitting on clouds. 

  1. Materials – The upholstery also matters a lot when choosing sunroom furniture. The quality of the furniture fabric decides the longevity of the furniture. As mentioned above, indoor furniture isn’t designed to be exposed to several hours of sunlight. While choosing furniture fabric, make sure that it has a high UV lightfast rating. The rating tells you the rate of color fading of the upholstery fabric. 

Indoor furniture usually comes with around 40 or 60 hours of lightfastness. That’s not nearly enough for outdoor conditions. Place that kind of furniture in the sunroom and it will start to fade within weeks. Instead, you’ll need special fabric dipped in advanced dyes that have over 2000 hours of lightfastness. You can make your sunroom furniture stay vibrant for a longer period if you install blinds. Pull down the blinds when you’re not using the sunroom. 

  1. Colors – Sun isn’t really friendly to colors. It has a bleaching effect on colors. Materials have chromophores, a part of the molecule that absorbs a certain wavelength of light and reflects the rest for humans to perceive colors. When materials are exposed to sunlight for long hours, it causes photodegradation. That means the structure of those chromophores gets damaged and that affects their ability to absorb and reflect light at a specific wavelength. 

That’s why materials appear dull and faded after long hours of exposure. The effects of photodegradation are so strong that it even fades away the color on concrete pavers if they aren’t sealed properly. However, all colors aren’t the same and some are more prone to photodegradation than the rest. Colors that have a larger wavelength in the visible spectrum are more fade prone. That means red, yellow, and orange fade away more easily. 

So, while choosing furniture for the sunroom, make sure that you use shades of purple, blue, and other such colors that have a shorter wavelength. Those colors will last longer in the sunroom. If that’s not possible, use neutral tones like cream and fog gray. They are elegant and stylish and would last in sunrooms for a lot longer. 

  1. Style – Your own style preferences will also guide you in the type of furniture pieces you’ll bring inside the sunroom. Sunrooms are big investments and the same holds for their interior decor. That’s why trying to come up with furniture pieces that give your sunroom a timeless look. If colors can’t be added to the furniture pieces, you can add a lot of greenery to make the sunroom more vibrant.  

Conclusion

As you can see, you have to put a lot of thought into choosing your sunroom furniture. From size and comfort to the shades and materials used on the furniture, everything needs to be well-thought-out. If a furniture piece breaks down, you can always search for “furniture repair near me” and hire professionals to fix it for you.

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