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Outdoor Living Spaces

Take the Indoors Outdoors This Summer!

By Anne Yankus

With all the arctic weather finally behind us, everyone is finding more and more excuses to spend time outdoors. One perfect excuse to get outside is to enjoy the comfortable and inviting outdoor living space you’ve created in your yard!

After the winter we’ve had, we could all use a little more opportunity to enjoy the outdoors. Having a dedicated outdoor seating area does more than give you a great place to take your laptop and work from home in the sunshine. It can increase your home’s value, give you a great place to entertain your friends safely, and even improve your health by lowering stress levels and getting you some much-needed vitamin D!

In order to create a truly awesome outdoor seating area, you’ll want to do more than just pick up some discount lawn furnishings and stick them wherever. Take some time to consider what kind of space you want to create and how you want to use it. Open porches, screened-in porches, three-season rooms, gazebos, and pergolas are all great options to take your outdoor space from bland to inviting.

Porches are making a comeback, so whether you have an existing structure on your home or are ready to build, there are plenty of new ideas out there on how you can use and decorate the space. These days, people are converting their porches into true outdoor living rooms, with outdoor/indoor drapes, hanging basket plants, lanterns, rugs, and more! Porch swings are still very much in fashion, from budget-friendly classic swings to easy-install gliders. You’ll also find new twists on the classic idea, like bed swings, swings with built-in tables, and transitional swings.

If you don’t have an existing porch structure on your home (or if the one you have needs some repair or refurbishment), you have the option of building (or replacing) with traditional wood decking, composite decking, or even concrete. Traditional wood is going to be your mid-range price option—cheaper than composite but pricier than concrete. Wood is widely available and versatile in design. Composite decking is going to cost you more money up front but will last longer and require less maintenance than traditional wood. Concrete is your cheapest and most durable option, but it doesn’t offer the versatility or design options you’ll get with wood or composite.

If you like the idea of a porch but are looking for something a little more protected from the elements, a screened-in porch might be right up your alley. Screened porches are most commonly made with fiberglass or aluminum mesh screens, which will generally protect your porch from insects, wildlife, and light rain. There are also more tightly-woven porch screens on the market that offer additional protection from sunlight, as well as pet-proof screens that will stand up to high-energy pets and children without tearing or breaking. If you really want to go all out, consider a motorized screen system that allows you to convert your screened-in porch to an open-air porch at the push of a button.

Perhaps even a screened-in porch seems a little too open for your purposes. If that’s the case, you’ll really want to look into building a three-season room. Three-season rooms give you the same great, unobstructed views you’d get on an open-air porch with more protection from the elements than a screened porch can provide. They are made with floor-to-ceiling glass windows, with no insulation and no foundation. This makes them cheaper than a conventional all-season home addition. As the name implies, they can be used for just about any purpose (from a home office to a dining area to a guest room), but only during the spring, summer, and fall months, when HVAC won’t be needed.

If you’d prefer a freestanding structure that isn’t attached to the house, consider a gazebo or pergola. These open structures provide some shade and ambience in the yard. They’re great places to sit with a good view of both the house and yard. Gazebos can be purchased in pre-designed kits made from wood, aluminum, or steel. They come in a wide variety of styles, from a traditional Victorian-style gazebo to more modern square or round models. Pergolas are open structures topped with lattice-style boards as a roof. For more shade and privacy, consider a removable canopy or drapes. You can also add vertical trellises for a living wall of climbing plants.

Whether you’re looking for a complete home add-on for your outdoor living area or something that provides just some partial shade and atmosphere, there are as many options to choose from as there are reasons to create and decorate your perfect outdoor seating space this year!

Sources for this article included: hgtv.com, gardenerspath.com, and thespruce.com.