Decorative Window Shutters

Zee
by Zee
4 Materials
$23
3 Days
Easy
Outside my back door i have an alley-way that leads out to my back yard. Its dark and dingy and i wanted to brighten it up. I gave the whole thing including the ceiling a coat (or six!)icon of white outdoor masonry paint. It looked much better but needed some decoration.
The surrounding doors and window frames are all painted blue (courtesy of our local Council) and my son had commented that the colour scheme reminded him of those lovely little Greek houses with the brightly coloured shutters at the windows. This gave me an idea..
There is a window in the alley connected to a small shed used for storage, it's been painted over by a previous Tenant and i decided to see if i could find some shutters to fit.
Always on a budget my mind started racing with ideas on how i could make the shutters from junk i already had and a few days later i came across an old set of wooden Venetian blinds, they didn't fit any of my windows (i had picked them up in a second-hand shop some months earlier not realising they were too short for my original intended purpose (doh!)
I set about stripping the blinds so i was just left with the slats. I needed to half every measurement so i had enough to make a pair of shutters, then i began measuring and cutting, once everything was cut to size i gave them a quick sanding and painted them with some a matt gloss blue paint (the area they are for is not exposed to the elements so it didn't matter if it was outdoor paint).
Once the paint was dry i laid two of the longer lengths (the height of the window) on a flat surface and then slowly glued smaller lengths across these from top to bottom, (the wood is very thin and lightweight ) so gluing was all that was needed but i did put a screw in each corner to secure them to the walls and this strengthened the whole thing.
once the shutters were in place i hung two hanging baskets next to them to finish the look. I will also be putting a small table and chairs underneath and I am thinking about painting a picture on the window for a future project (any ideas welcome) but for now i'm just so glad the dark dingy alley is brighter and i'm quite proud of my junk shutters!
Hope you like it, below is a before and after with a few pics to show how i achieved the look. Thanks for readingicon



The dark dirty Alley i wanted to clean up and decorate!icon


first thing was scrubbing and painting..
Much better! Now for some decoration..
I found an old set of wooden blinds, stripped the cord out and cut to size
Painted them all..
started Gluing..
I laid another layer of slats all around the edge to tidy up the look.
Really loving them! icon (I did drill a hole in each corner to strengthen the whole thing and attach it to the wall).
Finished!icon  
There are a few more bits i will add such as maybe painting a scene on the window and a small bistro table and chair underneath (my smoking corner...) I also have a stencil of some ivy leaves that i'm thinking of trailing around the shuttering using some green paint, maybe a window box with more flowers?
for now its much brighter and more pretty than i would have thought a dark dingy Alley-way could ever be, and so much nicer to see when i open my back door.
In all it took 3 days but only because of having to wait for paint and then glue to dry, actually hanging the shutters & hanging baskets took about 20 minutes.
Hope you like and i welcome any or all ideas you may have to add to this project.icon
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3 of 9 questions
  • Catrina Taylor Duffy Catrina Taylor Duffy on Jul 28, 2018

    Could you get any light inside by scraping the paint off of the window panes?

  • Lisa West Lisa West on Apr 21, 2019

    Yoir son is right. The area does look Greek like or Italian ancient time like. You did a wonderful job. I am thinking mir plants and lighting of course. String lights would look great and will make the space even more inviting. Now this space, is it for your entrance only or do other people access there home through this area to? Either way some nice lighting would be beneficial for this space. Once again it is very nice. Almost romantic lol.

  • Teresa Teresa on Apr 22, 2019

    I absolutely love this idea! Going to do this.

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  • Woy60789055 Woy60789055 on Mar 25, 2022

    Nice blog!


  • Zee Zee on Mar 31, 2022

    Thank you all for the lovely comments. I haven't been on for a long time due to personal issues, have been feeling very low and desperate about ongoing troubles. I haven't had the energy lately to do any d.i.y. and it has always been my happy place and i am desperate to have the energy to do more.


    Finding all these lovely replies.. i cant tell you how grateful i am, its reminded me there is a lot of good in the world. Thank you all so much.

    The next few months, i hope should bring some resolve to the worst issues i am currently experiencing. Once life is more settled i will be back.

    Thank you again ♥️

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