Last week I revealed to you our new patio cover. It's an absolute wonderful addition to our outdoor kitchen and deck that my hubby built himself. We have been talking about needing a cover for years and finally decided to take the plunge - since it's not something he can do himself. But, it took a great deal of planning and many man hours to get it to look like it does. Some of you have a great big finished basement, in comparison this is our "basement."
You can see above that there was some serious planning to get these enormous beams ready. They had to start by cutting our driveway and sinking the large vertical beams two feet under. The top of the beam, from the driveway, is about 12 feet high. There are also beams on our roof {remember we had to put a new roof on recently}. The city got involved and required a "bit" more welding and structural soundness than we had originally "planned" {meaning more $$ for permits and man hours} so this structure can LITERALLY hold a second story should we ever decide to move up there - or maybe park a car or two!! So, the canvas panels that are there now are certainly not going to pull down the structure!
The men welded this thing for TWO solid weeks. There are all kinds of cross beams, but there are also some small steel rods that you can see that are for the panels to hang from. They also primed and painted the entire structure. Then they came out to measure for the cloth panels and for about a month we strapped a tarp on the top of the structure - to give us an idea what it would be like, and to shield us from the scorching sun.
I chose two different fabrics for the panels. I have a charcoal tweed that is used on all the panels - that's the one on the right, above. Then, for the drapes, I used a charcoal gray with the tweed coming down the sides with the tie-backs in the tweed also.
You can see above, where I put the two fabrics. It's subtle, but gives more of a tie-in with the panels on the roof/cover. I also chose "boring" dark colors because we have S-M-O-G here...it's dirty and it's nasty. So, keeping these a dirty color will help to keep them from looking dirty - the tweed can help mask that on the roof panels especially.
You can see the Charcoal Gray Tweed panels above after they were {custom} sewn and with the rings attached to them. They are strong and sturdy.
Here's another view of them pull back and up close.
And to pull back the panels, you simply use the hook and pull across. It's got the possibility to move back all the panels -- in the winter when we want more sunlight or a few at a time when we want light here and there.
You can close up all the curtains in the late afternoon to keep the sun out or even to have more privacy. You may have noticed above that we are rather close to our neighbors - we are all right on top of one another here in our area, but the curtains add some necessary privacy {although we like all our neighbors and they are all very sweet}.
To hang the lights we bought magnetic hooks - since the entire structure is steel, it's the best way to hang just about anything. I spray painted the hooks black so you can't even see them. They blend right into the structure.
Some of you wonder what we do if it rains...Well, it's not rain-proof, so if it rains we get wet! But, here we normally have rain in October and February - occasionally we might have a "freak storm" {we did just last week} and it rains in July! But, in the "winter months" I just store the couch cushions in the shed and we can leave the panels open. There are grommets in the middle of each one for drainage - so it really doesn't matter if they are open or closed when it rains. Everything out here is pretty much weather-proof. We know it will get wet or hot or windy. The panels should not have too much trouble in the real windy days - our contractor has a similar set up at his house just a few blocks away and has virtually no maintenance on his.
And last, I want to show you some of these crazy angles of our deck that is tied into the patio cover. Some asked about whether this is custom - yes, very much so. You may wonder about the cost...well, I won't tell you exactly how much it cost - unfortunately it was more than originally expected since our city added many expensive costs we weren't expecting, but overall it was about 5% of what we actually paid for our home six years ago - that doesn't seem like that much when I say it that way! And, being that this is Southern California and this IS our dining room {which happens to be outdoors} AND if you knew us well, you'd know that it is WELL used - we host people over weekly. I hope you have any questions answered that you were wondering about the patio cover! Thanks for all your sweet comments!
You can see above that there was some serious planning to get these enormous beams ready. They had to start by cutting our driveway and sinking the large vertical beams two feet under. The top of the beam, from the driveway, is about 12 feet high. There are also beams on our roof {remember we had to put a new roof on recently}. The city got involved and required a "bit" more welding and structural soundness than we had originally "planned" {meaning more $$ for permits and man hours} so this structure can LITERALLY hold a second story should we ever decide to move up there - or maybe park a car or two!! So, the canvas panels that are there now are certainly not going to pull down the structure!
The men welded this thing for TWO solid weeks. There are all kinds of cross beams, but there are also some small steel rods that you can see that are for the panels to hang from. They also primed and painted the entire structure. Then they came out to measure for the cloth panels and for about a month we strapped a tarp on the top of the structure - to give us an idea what it would be like, and to shield us from the scorching sun.
I chose two different fabrics for the panels. I have a charcoal tweed that is used on all the panels - that's the one on the right, above. Then, for the drapes, I used a charcoal gray with the tweed coming down the sides with the tie-backs in the tweed also.
You can see above, where I put the two fabrics. It's subtle, but gives more of a tie-in with the panels on the roof/cover. I also chose "boring" dark colors because we have S-M-O-G here...it's dirty and it's nasty. So, keeping these a dirty color will help to keep them from looking dirty - the tweed can help mask that on the roof panels especially.
You can see the Charcoal Gray Tweed panels above after they were {custom} sewn and with the rings attached to them. They are strong and sturdy.
Here's another view of them pull back and up close.
And to pull back the panels, you simply use the hook and pull across. It's got the possibility to move back all the panels -- in the winter when we want more sunlight or a few at a time when we want light here and there.
You can close up all the curtains in the late afternoon to keep the sun out or even to have more privacy. You may have noticed above that we are rather close to our neighbors - we are all right on top of one another here in our area, but the curtains add some necessary privacy {although we like all our neighbors and they are all very sweet}.
To hang the lights we bought magnetic hooks - since the entire structure is steel, it's the best way to hang just about anything. I spray painted the hooks black so you can't even see them. They blend right into the structure.
Some of you wonder what we do if it rains...Well, it's not rain-proof, so if it rains we get wet! But, here we normally have rain in October and February - occasionally we might have a "freak storm" {we did just last week} and it rains in July! But, in the "winter months" I just store the couch cushions in the shed and we can leave the panels open. There are grommets in the middle of each one for drainage - so it really doesn't matter if they are open or closed when it rains. Everything out here is pretty much weather-proof. We know it will get wet or hot or windy. The panels should not have too much trouble in the real windy days - our contractor has a similar set up at his house just a few blocks away and has virtually no maintenance on his.
And last, I want to show you some of these crazy angles of our deck that is tied into the patio cover. Some asked about whether this is custom - yes, very much so. You may wonder about the cost...well, I won't tell you exactly how much it cost - unfortunately it was more than originally expected since our city added many expensive costs we weren't expecting, but overall it was about 5% of what we actually paid for our home six years ago - that doesn't seem like that much when I say it that way! And, being that this is Southern California and this IS our dining room {which happens to be outdoors} AND if you knew us well, you'd know that it is WELL used - we host people over weekly. I hope you have any questions answered that you were wondering about the patio cover! Thanks for all your sweet comments!
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Parties:
Tater Tots and Jello
