Seems to me there are two challenges - one, occluding a door, and two, delaing with the Palladian.

If you do not need function, i e do not plan to close the drapes, you could jsut have panels that fall on the left and right. But for them to appear to be functional, they would need to have a lot of material and then I don't see enough room to tie them back on the right.

Even if you used something quite sheer and had enough room, where would the rod be? I would think it would need to bisect your palladian window ...

In short, I agree it is a conundrum.

We will not be needing function -- the woods behind the house provide us with enough shade that the sun won't be coming through the windows blinding us. I just worry if I leave them bare, the wall may appear boring. I would most likely place a rod at the very top, above the palladian window, if I were to hang curtains of any kind.

as long as privacy wasn't a concern, i would probably leave them all bare-esp because of the door...once you decorate and paint, the focus will be off the windows.
i would love to be able to fully see the trees and landscape---there's nothing i'd want to hide from view!!!

if computer/tv glare or energy efficiency was a concern, i'd probably look into window tinting/films.

Since it isn't a matter of privacy, I would normally suggest using ceiling to floor drapery to frame the side windows. The problem with your windows is that your right side of the windows contains an entry door which you don't want to obstruct.

We have big windows across the front of our home. Since we don't need drapery for privacy, I framed them for decorative purposes only. However, I didn't have to deal with a door.

At the moment, I am having trouble envisioning how you could use drapery with how the windows are situated with the doorway being part of the whole picture.

Another option, and one that I would seriously consider is to re-orient the entry door to the far right in the adjoining room. Since you are at a place in the construction process where moving the entry door would not be much of a problem. Yes, it would cost you a bit, but I would seriously consider that at this point, while you are this juncture.

Very pretty windows!

You are worried that the wall will be boring if left bare?

Never. Nature is never boring! It will b beautiful "plain".

Thanks for the input everyone. work in progress, unfortunately, moving the doorway isn't something we want to do. We already have a door in the adjoining room (breakfast area, which leads to screened porch), but we purposely put this door in the family room for easy access to the deck for grilling.

I guess I will wait until the house is completed/painted/furniture is in. I have a feeling the windows may be just fine bare!

If blinding sun is not a problem, I would not hang curtains from above the higher windows. I would hang rod between lower and upper windows. Put stationary panels on left and right, and between window/window and window/door. I'd leave top windows unadorned. Here's an example of what I did in my family room, although it's a much smaller scale than your beautiful windows. Good luck and be sure to post pictures of that beautiful room when house is complete.

{{!gwi}}

What will the window frames look like? dark? painted? etc. If your house style permits, I would make the woodwork around them beautiful and do nothing with drapes. How lucky are you to have a huge wall of windows that don't *need* drapes............ With the view and all those lovely windows, I wouldn't cover them up at all.

I know I'm not answering your question, exactly, but I hope you are ok with other opinions. :)

I had expensive double pane, low e argon windows like that at my northern cabin overlooking a pristine lake. They and the view were absolutely stunning but... they were directly south facing. The heat build-up in summer, the heat loss in winter, the furniture fading and the spooky black "void" at night led me to finally put up moveable shutters on the top tier, panels on the bottom. (sigh) Sometimes function just has to take precedence over a beautiful form.

On the other hand, if none of those problems will be a concern to you, I would be tempted to let the impressive window architecture stand unadorned.

The windows are beautiful. I would leave them bare.

I think you are better off leaving them without curtains, unless you get the "black hole" feeling when it is dark outside with no window treatments. That was our problem with leaving the windows completely bare. Felt kind of eery. Framing them with drapery, yet not obstructing the view, totally eliminated the black hole feeling.

Not sure that a rod above the palladian would work. I've never seen it done. The palladian windows I've seen are usually done similarly to the window pic posted by jillinnj.

Would love to see your "after" pics.! What a lovely family room space!

I would leave the top windows - they are, in and of themselves, interesting to look at. The bottom ones, if there is room on the left, you could do curtains that could cover the whole wall but draw to the left. By doing that, if the windows need to be covered but the door might be used, the curtains could be drawn but stopped at the door. Late at night the curtains could also be drawn across the door.

There is something you can do to give UV protection but I can't recall the details. Make sure you look into it. The house we bought had such sun damage to the floors from all the light coming through our beautiful 2 storey windows. Not to mention the damage the sun does to fabrics especially silk. I haven't had time to deal with ours and haven't yet decided what I am going to do. Right now the uppers are blank/ open but there are venetian blinds over the lowers. Eventually they will go. They were left by the prior owners. I don't like the little plastic white blinds. To me it cheapens the look - but it will have to do for now. I do need some privacy for the lowers.

I would leave them bare! Those are beautiful windows, and the view outside is all the treatment they need!!

Low e argon is supposed to help prevent UV transmission through the glass. Wasn't enough in my case so I tried some of the film that is easily applied after window installation. It does actually work by blocking transmission of the UV waves. Trouble is that, sometimes very quickly, the reflected light builds up a lot of heat between the panes of glass, leading to premature seal failure. I took mine off again before that happened because I could feel how very hot the interior glass became. Most window manufacturers specifically void the warranty if these products are used so if the windows fail, you either have to put up with fogging or spend thousands to replace them needlessly.

Boring? With a view of the woods like that?

Let the view provide the interest.

Our vacation home has a great room with 2 story windows and we left them bare. We have over 100 acres of woods so privacy isn't a concern. The windows are not boring however at night these same windows become giant black rectangles on the wall. We knew that would happen so we installed landscape lights outside which highlight some of the trees in the yard.

The lights are at varying distances from the home so the view from inside has different depths of focus. As you walk through the room different trees and rocks are visible - the overall effect is rather stunning. We used uplights, downlights and spotlights to showcase the trees. We also sited the house so that we don't get direct sunlight shining inside in the afternoon which has helped keep sun damage to a minimum.

If at all possible I'd leave the windows bare. You can always add coverings after you've lived there for a while.