Living Room Blinds in Goa

Walk the room and mark the windows that are boxed in: the one behind the sofa, the narrow opening next to a built-in unit, the window above a console where a curtain would drag across ornaments. These are the blind windows. The wide openings onto the balcão or garden usually look better with curtains, and the two can share a colour so the room reads as one scheme.

If the television wall has a window beside it, give that window a blind even if everything else is curtained. It's the single change that most improves an evening in front of the screen.

Older Goan houses often have thick laterite walls and deep window reveals, which are ideal for an inside-mount blind: it sits flush, leaves the sill usable and looks built-in. Measure the depth first — zebra and roller mechanisms need a few centimetres, slatted blinds need more for the slats to tilt.

In newer flats, reveals are shallow and the frame is often not quite square. Mounting the blind on the wall above, slightly wider than the opening, hides the gap at the edges and blocks more light around the sides.

A blind is usually seen against the light, so its colour changes from inside. A pale grey can look almost white at noon and muddy at dusk. Hold samples up to the actual window, at the time of day you use the room most. For living rooms, a mid-tone fabric — oat, stone, soft taupe — hides dust and the yellowing that strong sun brings.

Decide how much you want to see out. Openness varies a lot between zebra fabrics; a more open weave keeps the garden visible, a denser one gives daytime privacy from the road.

The most comfortable living rooms we fit often use both: a blind inside the frame for daily light control, and a curtain dressed outside for softness and evening privacy. The blind does the work, the curtain finishes the room. If you go this way, leave enough projection on the curtain track so the fabric clears the blind headrail.

Keep the two in conversation rather than competition. A plain blind under a patterned curtain, or a textured roman blind in the same tone as plain curtains, looks considered; two patterns at one window rarely does.