Blinds for Goan & Portuguese Houses

A typical old Goan window has three layers: the glazed or oyster-shell casement, the timber shutters, and sometimes an iron grille or balustrade outside. Before adding a blind, decide what each layer will do. Often the shutters handle darkness and security, the casement handles the weather, and a blind is needed only for softer light control or privacy when the shutters are open.

In practice, that means a light roman or roller blind fitted high inside the reveal, clear of the shutter leaves, so the shutters can still fold back flat and close fully.

We never screw into carved or moulded timber frames. Blinds go into the masonry at the top of the reveal or the lintel above the window, using fixings sized for soft lime plaster and laterite. Where plaster is loose, we find solid material or use a small timber batten fixed into sound wall. Everything should come out cleanly one day, leaving the house as it was.

The balcão — the covered porch with its built-in seats at the front of many Goan houses — was designed for sitting out in the cool of the evening. A bamboo chik between its pillars on the sun side gives shade in the afternoon and a sense of privacy from the road, while keeping the breeze. Hang it from the beam, not the pillars' mouldings, and tie it down in the wind.

A roman blind in a heritage house reads like a curtain folded up. Choose natural linen or cotton in a colour that suits the lime-wash — ivory, sand, a soft ochre or a faded indigo. Line it for bedrooms; leave it unlined in rooms where you want light to glow through. Avoid glossy synthetics and bold prints, which feel modern against old plaster.