I'm hoping someone who's been through this dillema can give me some advice. My house is *VERY* small, so my home theater has to be in the living room. The living room has a vaulted ceiling, a fireplace, two skylights, a 5' wide sliding patio door, and the circuit panel box in the same corner that the TV sits. Setting this 12.5'x 17' area up for home theater has been a very tough challenge.

I think that I've solved most of the problems -- room darkening shades from www.symphonyshades.com for the skylight and the kitchen window; heavy, dark drapes in the corner behind the TV to cover the ugly electrical panel and give a dark surround around the television. I think I've even figured out the colors -- Laura Ashley "Ironwood" on the walls and Glidden "White on White" for the ceiling.

So right now my biggest problem is the patio door. One wall has the fireplace, and the other wall has the patio door, and the TV sits in the corner of these two walls. All the room darkening vertical blinds that I've found still let alot of light in. I was hoping for something simple, since this is the door into the back yard, and the two [rather large] dogs we have go in and out frequently -- I don't want it to turn into a big hassle. The vertical blinds that we have now are light filtering, so they're of no help.

I've contiplated using something like a large pleated room darkening blind, similar to the one I'm going to use on the kitchen window, in addition to the vertical blinds, but I don't think I can fit it behind the current vertical blind valance. Another option which seems to make more sense, is to use a roller shade. Pretty compact and shouldn't be too hard to put under the current valance, and can be used only when we need it. But it still has light emission problems around the edges. I have seen roller blinds that have a channel that each edge fit into that keeps light from leaking in around the edges, but of course I can't find them anywhere online using a Google search.

Maybe I'm making too big of a deal out of it, and a good quality set of room darkening vertical blinds would suffice. I have no qualms about replacing the verticals that I now have -- they're an "inexpensive" type anyway, and I hate the way the steel weight plates in the bottom of them keep sliding out.

If anyone has an idea or a solution, please let me know!

I don't have blackout binds myself, but I did notice that they were in the demo room at Sevenoaks sound & vision (I'm in the UK.) Failing that, just ask in any decent HT shop. Someone will know.

Incidentally, if you watch movies in the dark, you may want to try something lighter behind the TV, or the contrast between the bright screen and dark surround may cause eyestrain.

Dan,
Thanks for the response. I'm still looking, and so far, the only option other than heavy drapes is a horizontal blind, which will set me back anywhere from $300 ~ $700, depending on manufacturer and options.

I'm still looking around, and I think I'll probably end up going with a set of room darkening verticals, and see how bad the light transmission is. If it's too bad, I'll then probably go with a set of heavy drapes on top of the 'verts -- that'll be my excuse to buy a motorized track! I may make it so it's part of the drapes that's behind the TV.

I am looking at using a bias light behind the TV as one of the final touches -- I'm trying to get past the issues I currently have first!

I bought blackout curtains for my slider at Lowes. I think they were $20(?) for a package of two. Of course, it took three panels. They sit on their own rod and don't slide too easy, but it was a cheap quick fix.

Well I spent a lot more then $700 on drapes. I had them custom made with a light blocker material on the backside that faces my french doors. In the middle of the day the room is black with the drapes closed. I imagine you could get drapes made a lot cheaper. Go to an outlet and find material you like then get the light blocker and have them sewn for you. Then you just need the hardware to hang them. A lot of times cheap solutions look just like that though. This is going to be in the middle of your home so you have to think about how it looks as well as blocking out light. The drapery people can make swags and jabois (sp) and make nice weighted pleats when they sew them. Unfortunately this is very labor intensive and very expensive but I think gives the best looks. My ex wife made the original drapes as she was a decorator but not a drapery maker. She did this to save money and to be honest they looked like $hit. The pro's were able to pleat and weight those as well add the blocker for $1500. LOL That was just one set. I couldn't believe they were the same drapes. They really were worth the money. Good luck!!!!

I went to a fabric store and bought black out material.. They use it in hotels to put on the back of curtains and it works great.. 0 light gets in.. it is only about $8 cdn a meter..