Open Walls Widen Home Possibilities

Madison Modern Home Summer is a great time to live the indoor-outdoor life. We recently staged a home with a full-wall sliding door. Bringing the outdoors in actually inspired our staging of the entire house.

smoore The room opening up to the view of the bridge took my breath away! I could definitely live the indoor-outdoor life with a view like that!

lucia nice design

Erika Bierman Photography Beautiful homes!

pinpersia thank u .beautiful and minimalist ..i have one to at : http://www.pinpersia.com/%d8%b1%d9%82%d8%b5-%d8%a2%d8%b0%d8%b1%db%8c-%d8%a8%d8%a7%d8%b2%db%8c%da%a9%d9%86-%d8%aa%d8%b1%d8%a7%da%a9%d8%aa%d9%88%d8%b1%d8%b3%d8%a7%d8%b2%db%8c/

Rotsen Furniture Great projects!!! All beautiful, specially the one by Ehrlich Architects!

Kristina Sauerwein So dreamy. My perfect forever home would have walls of windows all over. Love the meshing of indoor-outdoor spaces.

Shelley Gardea Love the open wall concept! Great design and makes everything feel bigger and fresher by letting in that soft breeze. Beautiful.

Anu Sachdeva Second vote for Ehrlich! Its completely effortless and seeing a solid tree with a great foundation is inspiring.

Anita Roll Murals All the pictures are great! The first really caught my attention. I would love that.
Nice post Samantha!

Weiland Sliding Doors and Windows If you're concerned about weather, here's a flush track option we offer that has passed AAMA 101 at 12.1 PSF.

Lauren Elyse The only disagreement I have is to the urban version of an expansive view... there is ALWAYS a reason for art on the walls. Echoing views of skylines & mountains, or just color fields to accent the tonal view are super necessary to pull the outside in and make it seamless ;) Otherwise these are all spot on, great article!

llili olar me gusta mucho la capasidad de integracion a la naturaleza muy iluminado , exelente

beejay I am wondering where the chairs around the dining table in the industrial paned windows came from. Thank you for any help.

Jean Batty I always wonder about the lack of screens and bugs when I see pictures like this. Sorry to be a downer.

franki7 My dream!!! (And, a window washer's dream! :)) franki

brensmum I LOVE this idea...in theory. But I have to second Jean Batty's thoughts on practicality. Bugs? Birds? Squirrels? (of which, on any given day, I can spy half a dozen who'd love to run through my house!)

Kolbe Windows & Doors Kolbe offers two types of doors for expansive openings: TerraSpan Lift & Slide Doors and Folding Doors. A number of different operational configurations are available, including a 90˚ corner unit. Visit www.kolbe-kolbe.com for more information.

jfletch As beautiful as these are it is just to unrealistic in southwest Arkanas. We go from cold weather, to Spring with Pollen and then to 95 degree summers. My livingroom would be layered with a yellow film or outrageous electric bill. But I will continue to admire those that can.

Weiland Sliding Doors and Windows Liftslides have the option to come with screens. There are a couple options. Screens can be built mirroring the sliding panels or, if the opening isn't too large, retractable screens are available. Retractable screens are used on folding doors as well.

betsywk I agree with a couple of the comments above. While I love the open houses are beautiful, it is simply not practical in some climates. At our house in suburban Nashville, any or all of the following would/could come in because they are in our yard at least periodically: massive pollen, mosquitoes, flies, other bugs, snakes, squirrels, chipmunks, birds including wild turkeys, crows and turkey buzzards, skunks, rabbits, cows, coyotes, a bull, deer, to name a few. Oh those few, those happy few, who can indulge themselves with this concept!

donobrien I'm curious what it's like to live with a roll-up garage door in your living space? Seems it would be drafty and rattle-y........? I love the openness, but question the practicality. Does anyone have experience with them? Thanks.
BTW the doors are open on the Erlich home.

Tracy_Hopcus Jordan I have envisioned this exact thing for our new house - such a great set of images and ideas. It will help me articulate my idea to my builder.

melodee All Stunning! What a way to enjoy the beauty of God's creation.

missthunder AN AMAZING OPTION TO ADD LIGHT TO A HOUSE!!

alaskasail I spent a lot of time thinking about this option for a place I'm building right now. I used a garage door for the another place I built and loved it, but being in the Arizona mountains next to a wildlife sanctuary keeping the biomass on the outside became a problem. That resulted in the door being closed most of the time. Screens for such large area are problematic and sort of defeat the feeling of openness we wanted.

At the place I'm building now, we have spectacular views and using a series of folding doors when closed, would result in looking through a bunch of folding doors. They are also very expensive, have too many moving parts and may not seal well enough to keep out our high winds which would rattle them around noisily. I won't get into my research into the other system here, but suffice to say I looked at then all..... I think.

I decided on a compromise (don't we always) and went for a series of 16' standard Milgard aluminum sliding doors. We wanted the 1600 (commercial) series, but Milgard doesn't make them anymore. The result is that we have two walls of glass each with an 8' opening that are very easy to open don't make too much noise and offer a fairly unobstructed view. We added another sliding door on one wall resulting in nearly 40 linear feet of glass.

Another aspect of choosing was the energy efficiency of each type. Since this is a "green" house, we wanted the most energy efficient system we could afford. Thermal-break aluminum was too expensive and the extruded vinyl windows frames were too big and obstructed the view. In addition, considering the overall energy gloss/gain of so much glass, savings from one system over another did not give us an appreciable benefit for the cost.

So,.... we'll see when it's finished, but right now,... we love it.

Naser Foruhar Very beautiful

freedee56 I have a Nana wall door onto a porch, albeit on a much smaller scale. Outside the 8 foot opening I have a wood roof with transparent panels on top. I used a product called Mosquito curtain all around to create a "screened porch" outside the opening. The floor is continuos from the kitchen inside, to the porch. I keep the mosquito curtain open most of the time. When the mosquito curtain is closed, it hardly affects the view. Under the roof I hung 9 Moroccan lights.

I'm very happy with Mosquito curtain. Nana wall is tricky. The installation is very expensive and It's hard to get someone out here when it has problems. Still, I'm very happy with it.

davisbj We couldn't have an open house in Texas. I do love the look though. I'd like to have a garage door in a house, but not sure I'd want to open it very many times during the day. It's a great look. Also, it would be fun to tour these houses.

Samantha Schoech Thanks for all the feedback! Most of these are in California, where bugs are not a big problem and extreme temperatures are far and few between. As for larger critters, I guess it's all about choice. If I could live in a house like that first one, I'd take a few squirrels scampering through in exchange. We all live with some imperfection anyway, right?

Anyone out there actually live with a garage door as a retractable wall? I assume the quality of the doors and installation would prevent rattling and drafts. Also, most of these open on to enclosed yards which would save as windbreaks, etc.

Samantha Schoech beejay: I think the chairs you are talking about (the clear acrylics ones?) are the Tobias chair, from Ikea. http://www.ikea.com/us/en/catalog/products/20115038/

Karen Heidrich does anyone have an opinion about the size of the overhang?

Karen Heidrich also, the monochromatic space by Spinnaker seems claustrophobic. the wall feels like a mail slot. is it the camera perspective or maybe a lack of an interior focal point? i'd love an opinion.

sandracolleen Air curtain is the answer to make the application of open wall design practical. Many options/manufactures on the market; here is a link to how they work and benefits... http://www.fscc-online.com/HIW-Air%20Curtains/hiw-aircurtains.html

jillykel Beautiful houses and beautiful settings. But I was beginning to think you don't have insects over there in the US of A, when up came a few comments about mosquito curtains. Here in Melbourne Australia, you couldn't get through a summer without fly screens. Mosqiotoes and flies of various kinds would drive you crazy. I am envious!

marissa camacho We are having our dream home built here in the cooler part of the Philippines--in the highlands--and we have opted on an open wall of doors that slide fully to both sides of the living room. The porch segues into the living room so that we can double the entertainment space. Being a tropical country, mosquitoes, flies, frogs (and even, God Forbid, snakes!) can be a part of every day life. To keep uninvited guests away, we opted to have our porch screened in.

frenchdecor I am jealous, but I love it. I dream to build a garage in the line with the house and transform old one into 3 season living room with a small kitchen and wood burning fireplace with one full open wall (glass door or floor to ceiling window) facing backyard because we love to see outdoors. It's still out of our budget though. One day I hope I'll have it.

fredericklc I certainly understand the allure of the concept of an open wall but I can never get past the thought of the bugs and bees and birds and squirrels that would end up in my house. So, in theory, a great idea. In reality, not for me.

alaskasail When we're not in Arizona, we have a place in Alaska where mosquito screens really mean something, but in the spring, the place is crawling with brown (grizzly) bears so we have to beef up the mosquito netting a bit. These two were less than 20 feet from the door last week.

Harve We are building at the moment in thailand. The weather for most of the year is hot & humid. The bottom floor of the house is open plan about 140 sqm with bedrooms running off it. we have made spaced columns 6 meters apart. we have decided to go with PVC folding doors to the lounge area opening about 5 m onto the 5m patio & sliding doors from the kichen around 4m onopening onto the same patio.
The PVC is finished to look like wood. PVC a much better fit for the tropics as wood frames have a tendency to warp & shift over time with the high humidity. When I 1st saw the PVC the I thought it was a wooden sliding door, very nice looking & long lasting.
We have sourced retractable fly screens for the windows & they seem to be a perfect fit for whats required.
I love the idea of the garage door, maybe next time.

catrine36 I have a 2 bedroom apt over my detached garage and this is just want I want to do! It has the best view of the yard - I'd like to make an adult "tree house" of sorts as a large old oak is just outside the apartment. A big deck and open wall. Sigh.

Linda DeMars The only thing stopping me is BUGS!

davisbj We could use those doors here in Texas for about a week out in a year's time. I absolutely love the glass garage doors and all those open rooms.

myfenta really inspirational , i'll sure link my users http://www.studyingon.com of this site

aforbush Good way to divide large spaces inside the house too... that are sometimes open and sometimes closed off.

Retractable Screens, LLC Large openings are a great way to open up the inside space and allow owners to bring the outdoors in. Motorized screens are a wonderful solution because they allow owners to enjoy their open space without the annoyance of insects. They can include various mesh options such as insect, solar, and privacy mesh.