Where do you live? Do you need a full-sun southern exposure for comfortable winter porch-sitting?

Both choices would open from the same room, and both choices would offer excellent views.

There will be no winter sitting...we are in Cleveland LOL.

Krycek- where are you building? We are from the Medina area...

We will be doing a southeast covered porch...no screens, but covered.

Geauga County...not building yet, in a few years, but I'm trying to get everything sorted out in my mind and on paper so that when the opportunity arises we can jump on it.

The only sides that it can be are on the west, north, and east. The South will be the front of the house, so no screened porch there!

I think part of it depends on what time of day you will most often use the porch. I usually use mine in the late afternoon/evenings for dinner or a glass of wine. Which means I'm very glad not to have the western sun glaring in from the side in the heat of summer. If you envision morning coffee, where do you want the sun?

I am not a morning person. LOL. If I have days off from work, I usually get up around 10 or 11. So, we would most often use it in the late afternoon or evening. Not having the glaring sun and heat in summer would be nice.

Conversely, in September and October, we could be very thankful for the sun that comes onto the porch.

I would try to avoid the early evening western sun. In our current porch that western sun hits you right in the face if you are trying to have an evening meal out there. You could put in some sort of shades, but we never did that. Also, I think a breeze is nice, but the porch will get a lot dirtier if exposed to the west and north winds. Just a few thoughts...

I have a screened covered porch in my current house. It is on the north side of the house, and faces north, east, and west. We rarely use it - the north side of any house is not going to be that sunny, because the house blocks the light. It is pleasant to hang out there, but we just don't gravitate to it.

In the house we are building has a covered pavilion facing south, so it will get southern and eastern light primarily. The front of the house will block the western light. I think it will be ideal - the east part has a lot of trees so it will be filtered, and the southern light will be a nice constant all day long.

One more thing - with our current screened porch on the north side, and our deck on the north side, we never needed to get an umbrella for shade as we never get strong light back there.

If I were picking, I would do the porch on the east side.

Our plan will be the same as your north screened-porch. Dark? North is dark anyway - skylights will open it up as much as possible. Screened = summer, and that's the cool side. We'll have a covered porch on the SE side for hanging (in bug-free hours) and grilling.

That's the plan anyway, LOL. Enjoy yours!