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PLAINS TOWNSHIP — When you add a sunroom to your home, perhaps by enclosing a porch or some yard space, you can bring as much of the outdoors as you like into your living space.
Do you want lots of natural sunlight? The windows will let it shine in.
Are there times of day or seasons of the year when you’d like to tone down the light? Perhaps a strategically placed tinted window will shield you from the blinding rays of the setting sun.
“These are like sunglasses,” George Whibley from A & B Sunrooms and Remodel in Plains Township said, showing off window panes that offer ultraviolet protection while they cut down on glare.
Whibley, the general manager at A & B Sunrooms, is one of many vendors who plan to attend BIA’s Northeast PA Home Showcase, set for March 4-6 at the Mohegan Sun Hotel & Convention Center.
He’ll have plenty of sunroom options to show off, including impact-resistant glass, a flexible vinyl polymer you can use in place of glass and screens that seem to almost repair themselves.
“If you have grandchildren like I do,” he said, picking up a pen and jabbing at a demonstration-model window screen, “you know sometimes they poke at things.”
Sure enough, the pen had created a hole in the screen, big enough for a fly or mosquito to enter.
Rubbing his finger over the hole, Whibley said, “All you have to do is rub until you feel the heat, and it reverts to its original shape.”
People use sunrooms in all sorts of ways, Whibley said. “They can be dining areas, overflow areas, a getaway room, a cigar or smoking room, even a bird room.”
While some bird lovers might spend time in their sun room watching birds at a feeder outdoors, Whibley said, he knew of one person who used a bird room as a place for pet birds to fly around.
“You can do whatever you want,” he said.
At a previous homes show, Whibley said, an adjustable patio cover by Solara attracted lots of attention. With a louvred ceiling that can be opened or closed, the cover can shelter not only a patio but a garden or hot tub, Whibley said. “I have one over my swimming pool.”
It can also serve as the ceiling for a sunroom, Whibley said.
“The possibilities are endless.”
