Light is one of the most desirable things a home can offer. You may ask why someone would want to close up a window. I believe I can answer that now since we actually got rid of not one, but two windows this weekend.
First of all, both windows had a view of the neighbor’s vinyl siding two feet away. It’s my guess that the neighboring house was built after our 1920 2 story. But we didn’t close up the windows because we were appalled by the view of ugly siding.
One window was in the kitchen. At first, there were thoughts of extending the counter and putting in a smaller window. That could have worked. Then we were like “Wait. Why not get rid of the window completely?” We opted for more cabinets instead of a bit of light, making this tiny kitchen that much more practical.
*Don’t look at my bad taping job. It will be covered by cabinets!*
The second window was in the bathroom. A small window looking out, again, on to the neighbor’s siding. There is a normal sized window right next to it with an unobstructed view of the bay. The sheetrock was already finished but this small window looked totally weird butted up against the wall built around the pipes and sewer line. When we took said sheetrock down to let the plumbers get at the gas lines they were replacing, we thought that was our window of opportunity (You like how I did that there?) to make this area look less…what’s the word I’m looking for?….stupid.
The window in question sits behind the bathtub. I was thinking about some built in shelves which still would have looked uneven. Then hubby was like “Eh, what if we get rid of this one too?” Fine.
So, what’s the process of taking away a window? Skipping over the DOB legalities and heading right over to the how-to: It’s not as bad as I thought. Of course, it was Hubby doing all the work. And I should let you know that you shouldn’t try this if you don’t consider yourself a handy person. Bottom line is that you need to know what you’re doing enough to keep the moisture out of your house or you’re opening up a world of problems.
1. Take out rotted wood (in our case) and re-frame. Oh yeah, take out window first. Duh.
2. Build studs.
3. Plywood exterior side.
4. We have vinyl siding on this house so in this instance it’s plywood, tar paper, rigid insulation and siding. If you have brick or brownstone, it’s more skilled. Eh, chances are you’re in an attached house anyway and don’t have to worry about it.
5. Interior. Insulate between studs.
6. Sheetrock.
7. You know the rest. Tape, paint, done.
