Well said Jan. I agree pick your battles and this one will be expensive to win and honestly not IMO worth the money for such a short time of use.

I also live in NY (downstate-Long Island) and have a screened porch with combination screen/glass windows. I had it built and used the screen/glass inserts from the Combination Door Company. When the seasons change, you can replace the glass with screens or vice versa, to suit the weather.

Here's a link to their website:

https://combinationdoor.com/easy-change-combination-storm-screen-doors-overview.php

Here's my porch. Two of the panels are doors, and 9 of them are fixed, but all have both screens and glass panels that are easy to change.

Screened Porch · More Info

Screened Porch · More Info

I had a screened porch in another house, with only screens, and in the winter it took a beating. The dust and debris that got in was awful, and every spring we had to do a major cleaning. This porch gets some dirt in during the winter even with the glass panels, but nothing like the one with screens only.

Yes, I have a client with the combo , on a nearby finger lake.

Always an option, just find a great place for storing in switch outs.

Resources usually decide these things:....: )

Yes, Jan, resources are always the driver. We store the switch outs in the attached garage. And adjustments may be necessary if the openings aren't standard.

We had a screened 4-season porch in Brooklyn (I miss it now), and glass and screens had to be swapped around, and as Diana mentioned, the screens take a beating from debris and pollen, etc, and need to be cleaned or re-screened if they get damaged.

Jan also made a good point that casement windows are the best way to go, having screens on the inside, they are always protected from the weather, and you never have any issues.

When I built my house in Jersey, I put all casement windows. 20+ years later, all the window screens are like new, and all the sliding door screens had to be re-screened, and one got damaged again after the last storm.

If you can go with casements, it will cost a little more, but you not gonna regret it... It's a pain in the neck to take screens out and swap them with glass during seasonal changes, etc, and worry about where to put them, and they can get damaged during storage.

Good luck

I've seen our climate go from 7/5 to 8/4 to 9/3...and this year? The THREE has not been great.

Welcome to Upstate: Where Summer is often jokingly referred to as "the fourth of July, and Construction" So unfortunately true it would seem THIS summer. I'm running out of time for summers.....I DESERVE better, lol way better!

I hear you, Jan. Mother nature at its best, you don't know what to expect from it anymore.

Thank you for all your feedback. The porch is already screened but the screens are not super tight. Is that normal? Which brand of casement windows do you recommend? Is there any that are affordable?

I recently came across glass inserts as a potential solution, and the thought of replacing it was something I had in mind.

The screened porch is off the dining room on the first floor. From the screen porch, you can access the deck. In my photo, you will see a concrete block on the floor on the far left. That is the door to access the deck. You would need an extension ladder to reach the top of the screens from the outside. That might present some challenges when trying to clean them.

I did consider casement style initially and sliding windows. I have 13 openings and wanted to make some of them fixed windows, and a few just regular windows. I got a quote for vinyl double windows to match the opening and that was about 8K for all 13. They are Okna 500 series. Some of the windows in the house are fairly large, so the large ones in the porch will match. I also looked at Fibrex at the local lumber store. They are nice windows, but costly.

As with all things, you get what you pay for: )

Saggy screens? No reason other than they might have been cheap, and they're old. Sounds like routine maintenance didn't happen on the entire porch. They should certainly be taut, and that is the frame and quality of screen. BOTH.

My Mom's house had a 10'x10' screen porch, in Minnesota. She practically lived out there all summer. The floor was indoor/outdoor carpet; in the fall, she put plastic down over the floor, and covered the furniture with plastic (the cushions came inside). In the spring all we had to do was take up the plastic, brush the screens with a broom, and she was good to go.

Cedar Wash is a cleaner that is Ph formulated to gently clean the cedar siding. No matter what you do cedar it has to be washed before anything can be applied.

Never had a screen porch before. How do you clean it with Cedar Wash? From what I saw it says to spray, wait for like 10 minutes and rinse off with garden hose. If you zoom in in the photo, you can see the base of each screen opening is grayish, and it looks like some mildew. Will cedar wash restore it? And do I need to apply stain after that?

That's a great idea of covering the floor and furniture with plastic.

I think it's a lot of worry over what is simply ....nature? Isn't the porch, whether it shall be totally open or screened , the wonderful halfway point of indoors to outdoors? That seems the original intent, and not a bad idea at all.

Seriously, if you need it as clean as your indoor rooms, you perhaps need to stay indoors: )! but maybe you will miss the joy of that half point- and the fact that it wasn't intended to be like indoors. We have sun rooms for that purpose.

Clean it up, cover the stuff if you must, power wash it, and just enjoy the darn thing. Get some comfy cushioned furniture and settle in.

A girlfriend in my youth had a huge screened porch. We slept out there, despite it faced the street and was on a corner! I still remember and sigh.........: ) Pure BLISS.

@AnnKH It reminds me of my aunt's house, all the indoor furniture was wrapped in plastic. During parties, everyone used to hate sitting on it, especially in the summer, you got stuck to it. At least your mother took it down for the season; my aunt never did. I think it was like this since the day she got it. lol

LOL!!!!!!!! @ GN

Thirty years ago, I'm at my upholsterer in the very sketchy part of town that was at one time very lovely, ninety percent Italian descent.....a mere handful of elders and their immaculate front yards still present, along with some fabulous bakeries. The rest moved to the burbs. But? Habits do not die, they simply relocate.

There was a gigantic bolt of heavy duty clear plastic being delivered.

I asked......" what the heck do you do with THAT?!" That's a whole lotta PLASTIC!"

Frank laughs......and launches into the number of damask sofas/chairs he covers annually for bulletproof protection from all things nature or human....

" Don't you stick to it in summer!? " Throws his head back, laughs his ass off, and makes a long sucking sound........: )

OMG, memories! I remember those plastic covered sofas and chairs!!! YUCK!!! Thank goodness my Italian-American mom never did that. My friend's (also Italian-American) mom did and it was awful, especially after the plastic cracked! However, we only sat on the furniture in the living room during holidays :(

So ironic, when we cleaned out her house 60 years later, the white damask sofa looked like new, but no one wanted it.

I had a friend whose mom NEVER removed the plastic from the lamp shades.....: )

In our basement, my dad had a deep built in bench covered in boat vinyl, to make easy work of soda spills and potato chip grease. Let me tell you just how steamy /sweaty the teenage necking on that OLIVE green thing ......?! Ah yes.......plastic, the ninth wonder of the world lol

Wow Jan, going back memory lane here.... lol

I left Brooklyn in the late 80s, you're right, Italian neighborhoods slowly started to fade away, 18th Ave used to be like little Italy, today it's more like Chinatown, same goes for Little Italy in NYC.

I'm only 25-30 minutes from the Varrazzano bridge, I still make trips back to get cold cuts, Brooklyn bread, etc, and still have a few friends there, so when we can get together, we hit Gargiulo's Restaurant in Coney Island, been going there the last 40+ yrs, when lived in Brooklyn that place was every Friday dinner place like a ritual.

As Dean Martin once sang Memories are made of these! :-)

You're right GN! My dad went back to the old Polish neighborhood for decades! Just to get dark rye and cold cuts. The absolute BEST!

Sadly, the street we lived on until I was eight is no longer even safe for a drive by. My grams old house, forever immaculate , eat off the floor IN THE GARAGE?? Beautiful rose garden? Now a crack house.

It's great that in Coney Island some of the wonderful old haunts survived. PS.....love that Dean Martin song and so much of all the music at that time. I should add that none today is nearly as good : ) I can't hum to anything, it would seem.

Sometimes I find myself missing NYC, and some of our old haunts...Grotto Azzura in the village, Sign of the Dove, Il Ministrello, A la Fourchette on 46th between 8th and 9th, ( omg, the rack of lamb and the escargot !) Chinese on Sunday night at Billy Hong, freeze your can off at the corner of 52 and Sixth - THE coldest corner in the USA? and so many more, including the hard roll , buttered and wrapped from the street cart. None other like it .....anywhere: )

I think it is a wonderful screened porch, and I'd keep it just as that. Screens are easy enough to replace if the elements ding them. Rather than closing it in, might you consider one of those portable heaters like restaurants use on their terraces, for when it's just a tad too cold to sit outside without one?

I'd put down a tough floor in a stone, if budget and structure allow, or possibly a rustic-looking porcelain tile, if not. I assume you have the little venty things at the bottom, or drain holes, so you can just hose it down periodically for a deep cleaning?

I'd place furniture that is also easy to clean, with removable cushion covers that can slip into the washing machine.

@bj Thanks for your suggestions. I do not have any venty things at the bottom nor drain holes. It has plywood subfloor. I just sweep it for now.

Thank you all for your feedback!

So what did you decide, Azuka? Can you post photos?