Creative thoughts please! I've had a hardwood/glass conservatory on my southish-facing kitchen wall for about 15 years which now needs replacing. I am not expecting it to be a habitable room all year round but I am hoping to improve on what's there at the moment, so I'm thinking solar-reflective glass (and self-cleaning, if that actually works).
The current shape is a simple apex roof with a gable end, shown in blue on the diagram - note south is upwards. The west wall is our two-storey extension with a box gutter and the east is rendered Thermalite block, adjacent to next door's single storey kitchen extension. We'd like to keep the apex shape because of the height it gives and a lean-to with its roof sloping away would not look good from the kitchen.
Light is an issue - because of the solid walls it's important to have a roof that lets through a good deal of light or the kitchen is dingy. Depending on ambitions/finances we might have the section of wall in the kitchen between the window and the doors removed to allow more glass to be put in.
A big problem is the sight lines on the diagram - the neighbours can look straight through the conservatory roof from their unobscured bathroom and bedroom windows, into the conservatory, the extension and parts of the garden which would otherwise be private. Having blinds permanently down along the east face of the roof defeats the object of it being glass and they're adept at catching insects. Using polycarbonate on that side would offer privacy but we'd rather avoid that.
Something which I believe would solve the problem would be an arrangement of louvres running up and down the roof, which could be angled to block the sight lines and yet still allow the sky to be seen from inside the house and conservatory. Even better, if they were external and controllable they could be shut completely to cut down the heat and possibly provide a bit of insulation in the winter. But can I find such a thing? You can get plenty of horizontal louvre systems, but I have never seen any which run up and down the roof.
So, does anyone know of such a thing, or have any other ideas, please?
The current shape is a simple apex roof with a gable end, shown in blue on the diagram - note south is upwards. The west wall is our two-storey extension with a box gutter and the east is rendered Thermalite block, adjacent to next door's single storey kitchen extension. We'd like to keep the apex shape because of the height it gives and a lean-to with its roof sloping away would not look good from the kitchen.
Light is an issue - because of the solid walls it's important to have a roof that lets through a good deal of light or the kitchen is dingy. Depending on ambitions/finances we might have the section of wall in the kitchen between the window and the doors removed to allow more glass to be put in.
A big problem is the sight lines on the diagram - the neighbours can look straight through the conservatory roof from their unobscured bathroom and bedroom windows, into the conservatory, the extension and parts of the garden which would otherwise be private. Having blinds permanently down along the east face of the roof defeats the object of it being glass and they're adept at catching insects. Using polycarbonate on that side would offer privacy but we'd rather avoid that.
Something which I believe would solve the problem would be an arrangement of louvres running up and down the roof, which could be angled to block the sight lines and yet still allow the sky to be seen from inside the house and conservatory. Even better, if they were external and controllable they could be shut completely to cut down the heat and possibly provide a bit of insulation in the winter. But can I find such a thing? You can get plenty of horizontal louvre systems, but I have never seen any which run up and down the roof.
So, does anyone know of such a thing, or have any other ideas, please?
