Home Improvement Project

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druryj

In Remembrance / Dec 27 2021
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I think this came out well. My house is built around an open air atrium. It’s like 15’ X 13.5’ , There are sliding doors into it from both the living room and the master bedroom plus a window in the entryway and another in the kitchen the looks into the atrium. It is a really cool thing to have; especially for outdoor living in the wintertime. We put a hot tub and a chiminea in there for winter and it’s great. The issue is in the summer, it gets hotter’n hades in there. So I built a shade fabric screen, two of them actually, to cover it from PVC pipe reinforced with a strip of wood and PVC clips and ... you guessed it: shade fabric, like used in many plant and garden centers. I put eye bolts in at the top to anchor the thing to and had a beam put across the top of the atriums opening to drape the fabric over. It cuts the temp in there by almost 15 degrees and gives you some good shade instead of the blazing sun. Check out the pics. First one is looking into the atrium from the master bedroom. Pic 2 shows the open air top of the atrium and the one side of the connection of the shade panel to the top of the atrium itself. Pics 3 and 4 shows the two shade panels stretched across the beam and anchored in on the eye bolts using some Godzilla-like zip ties.

I think my home made shade screen came out very well! The hardest part was crawling my old self up there and hooking everything up whilst laid out on my belly and trying not to slide off the roof. It’s really a balancing act to get the two panels aligned and requires back and forth adjustments all done crawling in your belly or scooting on your butt back and forth on that roof. But it’s done! Next year, I may pay some kid to do the labor part while I sit inside the atrium in s comfortable lawn chair with a mint julep or something and direct the attachment of the shade panels.
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okierider

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J call and I will be there !!! I know u Marines all think ur Superman and need no assistance but call I will be there brother!!!
 

druryj

In Remembrance / Dec 27 2021
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Looks very good! You did a great job, but I agree someone a whole lot younger needs to put it back up next summer. We don't heal very quickly any more.

Is this that why I can barely crawl out of bed this morning? I thought somebody had beat me with a bat when I was asleep.


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druryj

In Remembrance / Dec 27 2021
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Interesting your house has that sort of atrium! How old is it?

House was built in 1985. Can you imagine what it would cost to build around an atrium like this today? It adds a lot to the exterior in order to have that 200 sq ft open air rectangle built right smack dab in the middle of the house.

J call and I will be there !!! I know u Marines all think ur Superman and need no assistance but call I will be there brother!!!

Now, why didn't I think of that?

A lot of those houses at Reno and Mustang area. I like your solution.

Yeah, I live in Westridge, just south and west of Reno and Mustang I am not sure how many homes out in this addition have them, but from up on my roof, I can see like 4 or 5 houses that do. It was a major selling point when we first saw the house. It sorta freaked me out the first time I walked in the front door and saw this window in the entryway that looks out into the atrium. I mean, I'm standing in the entry and I can see a coiled up garden hose through the window...like I was already looking through the back door or something, and only like 10 or 12 feet away from the front door. I was thinking "Man, this is the narrowest house I've ever seen...and they want how much?"

The cool part is in the winter, it can be snowing, cold as hades... and I can have a fire going in the Master Bedroom, step out into the atrium and into a 101 degree hot tub, get a fire going in that Chimenea and lie back w relax while looking up at the stars. My biggest worry then is how to keep the snowflakes outta my hot chocolate. I found that those little umbrellas work pretty good. I'll post a pic of how it looks from the front door, the kitchen window, and the living room as you look in the atrium from pretty much anywhere in the house except the spare bedrooms and bathrooms. (Gotta wait a few for Momma to get up so I can go turn on the lights in there and take pics).

Okay, here’s some pics looking into the atrium from the entryway, living room, and kitchen to go along with the one in post # 1 from the master bedroom.
Entryway view:
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View from living room:
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View from kitchen window:
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We are happy to have found a house with this kind of feature. It lets us enjoy being outside but with the added plus of complete privacy as well. The atrium is accessible from either the master bedroom or the living room. We can eat outside, sit outside, hot tub it, or just have a fire going and watch the stars slip by. Naked even.
 
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