You love your home’s open-concept living area, which gives you a full view of every corner of the shared spaces of your home. You love how vast it makes your home feel; you love the freedom it provides in decorating; you love everything about it — except how difficult it is to heat and cool.
Temperature is notoriously difficult to maintain in larger spaces. If you are tired of paying a sky-high energy bill, you might consider the following tips for keeping your great room at a comfortable temperature year-round.
Seal Cracks Around Doors and Windows
Your home’s exterior envelope is its main protection against unwanted changes to the interior temperature, but as your home ages, its envelope degrades. You need to be diligent about looking for holes and cracks in your home’s exterior and sealing them with mortar, caulk or whatever other materials are appropriate given your home’s construction. You should be especially careful to check for cracks around doors and windows, where the envelope is already particularly weak.
Cover Windows With Efficient Coverings
Often, great rooms have great windows, which bring in astonishing amounts of gorgeous natural light. Unfortunately, this natural light tends to come with heat, which becomes trapped in your home due to the greenhouse effect. During the cold season, you might not mind a little natural warming, but during hotter months, you definitely need a way to prevent the temperature from increasing and putting unnecessary strain on your AC. You might consider installing automatic blinds, which will descend and retract on a schedule you set, or at least motorized blinds, which can be controlled easily with a remote. If nothing else, you should hang curtains or some other type of shade that can stay closed during the brightest and warmest parts of the year.
Fill the Space With Seasonal Textiles
Different types of materials respond to different temperatures in different ways. It’s why you might choose to cover your beds in flannel sheets during the wintertime and breathable cotton through the summer months; some textiles trap and hold onto heat. You should use this to your advantage in your great room, swapping out different textiles throughout the year depending on your temperature needs.
For example, in the summer, you might cover your flooring with a simple rug of natural fibers like cotton or jute. Then, when winter comes, you can layer another rug on top that has a fluffier texture for maintaining heat. You can apply the same logic to throw pillows and blankets, curtains and even wall hangings.
Hang Ceiling Fans
Ceiling fans should be every homeowner’s favorite home fixtures. These overlooked appliances can save you tens of thousands of dollars in heating and cooling over their lifetime, so you should consider hanging one in every room of your home — including your great room. You can find large ceiling fans in modern styles that will provide enough airflow to make every corner of your open-concept space more comfortable in every season. As with your window shades, you might consider investing in smart or automated ceiling fans, which can be set to a schedule for greater energy savings and convenience.
Decorate With Living Plants
Indoor plants never go out of style, which is why some of the most timelessly chic homes are filled with them. By tending a garden inside your great room, you will introduce more moisture into the air which can help reduce wild temperature swings, especially during the warmer months.
Additionally, you might consider how you can add more plants to your outdoor landscaping to reduce the load of your home’s exterior envelope. Large shade trees, especially trees that are native to your regional environment, can keep light and heat off your walls, roof and windows, which will make it easier to maintain a stable interior temperature. Even small shrubs planted around great room windows can block wind and light. Plus, a mature landscape can add to your home’s value.
You don’t need to break up your great room into several tiny, claustrophobic spaces to lower your energy bill and ensure comfort for you and your guests. With the right preparation, you can ensure that your great room looks and feels great.