Lanai
May 24, 2010
There is a lanai (sunporch) on the front of our vacation home. I'm not sure why it is called a lanai but lanai is the Hawaiian term for sunporch or verranda so likely lanai sounds a bit more tropical. We are not new to sunporches as the turn of the century home we renovated had a small all season sunporch on the main level and this house has a 3 season sunporch spanning the width of the house on the upper level. The house we are planning on moving to if we sell this house also has a large 3 season sunporch.
Sunporches are usually designed as all season or 3 season with most 3 season being convertable to all season by installing windows in front of the screens and providing some type of heat. They are light, bright and airy shielding from the heat of the sun but with lots of light for growing a multitude of plants. Screening keeps them for the most part pest free but insects can and do get inside unless they are well sealed. In northern regions such as our permanent home in Ontario, Canada a sunporch can double as a heat sink in the wintertime. As the sunporch warms on sunny days it can heat up enough to provide passive solar heating for your home.
The vacation home lanai is off of the kitchen with the only entrance being through the kitchen. This is the one room where we will be doing the most work. The previous owner left an artificial fig tree, a small plant stand and a patio set. The chairs were in such rough shape we discarded them. The new chairs are black while the table is a faded olive green that I will likely paint black during our next trip. There was indoor/outdoor carpeting on the cement pad. We pulled it up simply because we thought it looked awful and since we only have screens both rain and dust can get it making the carpet a horrid dirt trap. We had the inside of the lanai power washed when the outside of the house was done. Since we are not there all the time I will keep the plants to artificial ones that can be brought in while we are gone. Any decorations will also be brought in as we already had a taste of how violent some storms can be there. Here's what we have planned for the lanai so watch for all these projects as we get to them:
- install ceiling fan
- paint floor
- install windows to make it all season
- install window treatment to shade afternoon sun
- basic, low maintenance decorating
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