Since early 2020, we’ve talked to more people about shutter ideas than ever before. It’s hardly surprising – the last few years have seen millions of people seriously reconsider their living space.

For some, the lines between living and working space have become blurred. For others, the home has become a sanctuary where rest and recuperation is more important than ever before.

Here, we’ve looked at a huge range of interesting and innovative ways people have been renovating their homes – many including wooden shutters.

You might decide that this is just the kind of inspiration you need to reinvigorate your space – then again, you might instead overhaul your home with a view to cashing in on the booming property market.

Renovation vs relocation – the choice is yours!

According to Country Living magazine, new research suggests that 69% of people in the UK are planning home improvements in 2022.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, getting the masking tape and dust sheets out for some general touch-ups or redecoration is top of people’s list of renovation projects – but a colour refresh isn’t the only thing that people are planning. Other ideas include:

• Fitting new flooring/carpets 
• Fitting a new bathroom 
• Fitting a new kitchen 
• Building an extension 
• Creating a cabin or extra room in the garden 

• Converting a loft 
• Creating an office 
• Knocking through rooms to create more open space 
• Converting a garage

Although almost all garden space is wonderful, it becomes a real luxury when you can easily step from your kitchen or living room with morning coffees or some evening tapas and a glass of wine.

This is where new French doors or sliding patio windows come into their own.

Not only do they bring natural light flooding into your home – they give a real connected feel between inside and outside space. Evening dining or entertaining inside your home feels different when doors are open, birds are singing, and the cool evening air is circulating.

Of course, almost all UK homes are overlooked – either by neighbouring properties or nearby roads and pavements – so sliding plantation shutters for patio doors are a stunning way to add privacy without compromising daylight.

Garden renovations are a beautiful start to opening up your home – but if you want to turn things up a notch, patio doors and interior shutters take the look to a stunning next level.

If you like to stay on top of life admin, then maybe a dedicated office would work for you. Then again, if you’d like to flush life admin from your mind for a while – a peaceful area that works for mindfulness, yoga, or just quiet reading might be just the ticket.

There are countless hobbies and interests that you might decide deserve space outside of the normal cupboard they live in. Would express your artistic side with painting, drawing, or creative equipment area work for you? Or maybe that rarely-used spare bedroom could become a playroom for kids or grandkids?

If it’s not practical to repurpose an entire room, then using plantation shutters as room dividers mean you can use part of an existing room without having to commit to new walls or fixed-use spaces.

Of course, if you’d like to take a more permanent approach to reimagine your floor plan, removing partition walls can transform your room beyond all recognition.

It might sound counterintuitive if you like the idea of going open-plan – but with plantation shutters as room dividers, your new vast rooms can offer the best of both worlds.

If you want to enjoy your space, they’ll fold back completely and take up virtually no space – but if you need to divide your room down again, you’ve got the option to do so quickly and effortlessly.

According to the Halifax House Price Index, average property prices were up by 9.8% in 2021 – an increase of over £24,500. In some areas, these increases were significantly more – with estate agents noting that over-asking-price offers are increasingly common as people snap up newly listed properties.

This can make the property market an intimidating place for a buyer – so it’s no surprise to see more and more people converting loft spaces as a cost-effective way of creating more space.

Although loft conversions are often carried out to create an additional bedroom, there’s no end of possibilities if you have the right kind of space.

Loft conversions often become:

• Bedrooms with en suites
• Office or project rooms
• Studio apartments
• Lounge or living room space
• Gyms
• Cinema rooms

Shutters as room dividers in lofts

Although it’s perfectly possible to create interior walls in loft conversions, these fixed boundaries can make the space begin to feel cramped – especially when you’re working with a sloping roof.

This is why people often opt for wood shutters as room dividers – creating flexible space that can be opened up wide to enhance the feeling of space when you’re in your new room.

By-pass or bi-fold sliding shutters work exceptionally well in these cases – creating beautiful walk-in wardrobe-style spaces that can be opened right up when access is needed.

Garage conversions are one of the most cost-effective and quick ways to add a significant extra swathe of floor space to your home.

A big part of why converting a garage is so popular boils down to the lack of upheaval.

Having a similar-sized extension built could involve months of building work and associated disturbance – but transforming your garage often takes less than two weeks.

With an impressive existing aperture in place, many people choose French doors as a straight replacement for an up-and-over garage door.

This makes privacy tricky though – especially as virtually all garage fronts are accessible from the street.

Shutters offer a fantastic solution to this problem.

Bi-fold shutters let you close the front of your new room off completely when you’d like privacy – or simply angle the louvres so it’s only the sun that can see inside.

Of course, if it’s a bright sunny day and you’re happy to let the warmth and sunlight flood in, then fold your shutters back and enjoy your new space!

Mounted on virtually invisible tracks, room dividing plantation shutters can fold back against the wall when it’s time to relax or have some quality family time – but can be effortlessly moved into place when you need to work through those emails.

This makes working from home easier on family life too – an effective room divider means you don’t have to ban people walking to the kitchen while you’re making a video call in the dining room either!

Today, there’s a huge emphasis on renovating property in a way that is sustainable, ethical, and energy-efficient.

Fast fashion is a phrase we commonly associate with clothing – but fast homeware is quickly becoming a problem in its own right.

First coined by the media outlet Refinery 29, the idea of fast homeware is simple; cheap homeware products with price-tags that are so appealing they make us forget the environmental or ethical impact of what we’re buying.

Often, that impact is significant. Especially when trends come and go so quickly.

Clearly, the prospect of picking up perfectly-sized antique shutters in a charity shop is beyond unlikely – so buying new, made-to-measure shutters is the only real option.

The question is, can this be done while keeping sustainability at the forefront of your mind? With Shuttercraft, it can.

A quick browse through our range of shutter styles will give you some insight into where the raw materials for our shutters come from.

From sustainable Ayous wood plantations in the Solomon Islands – to the ethical sourcing of Paulownia wood for lighter-weight shutters with a reduced carbon footprint, we’re proud to push back against the damaging trend of fast homeware.

Of course, this doesn’t mean that your shutters aren’t an attractive addition to your home.

It means they’re a timelessly stylish and long-lasting addition that we expect to be locking heat into your home for years to come.