Getting More Light With Velux
Our house has definitely taken a shift since purchasing it. From painting it all white after it was painted every colour in the crayon box, to even ripping down and moving walls. We have done everything we could to make sure this house is light and bright and happy for our family.
When we renovated our back room, Taking it from one large awkwardly laid out long room, to two separate rooms, We not only gained a main level laundry/mudroom that has been a huge help to our lifestyle, but we also created a cozy and warm space as a family room.
The only issue with this big change, we took a room that was already somewhat dark on a part of the home that has little light all year round, to a room with only one window, no air flow, and it became very dark. Even in the dead of summer, on the sunniest day, we would need to have lights on in the family room for the kids to comfortably play. It sucked.
We tried to think Of many ways to execute adding more light into the room. Did we add a ceiling light and still use artificial light throughout everyday, do we restructure the exterior wall to add French doors into the back yard? or do we look at adding some form of a skylight? That way even on the darker days there is natural light shining down where the kids play.
On Instagram we had discovered a brand called Velux. It turns out they are the same Skylight company my parents have had in our childhood house since 1991. They have invented something called a sun tunnel where you drill a large hole through your roof and the ceiling of your room and you put in what would look like a flush mount ceiling light but it actually is just the sunshine shining through. At night, that Flush mount of natural sunlight can be turned into a regular light with a light bulb. We loved the idea of this so we started looking into the brand itself.
Once we started, we actually realized that what we truly wanted as an end goal was as much light as possible. We also wanted some form of ventilation in that back room as the only window that is in there doesn't open. We ended up looking at installing two Velux skylights in a row. That way we could get the most amount of light. We made one sedentary, and for the other one we went with one of their Top of the Line fully Interactive opening Velux Active windows.
Velux Active not only is totally solar paneled making it easy to install without an electrician, but also makes it so that we could even use it when there is no power which happens often in our rural area. Not only does it sense when there's rain and close automatically, but it also reads the air in the space and opens and closes depending on your humidity levels, Your interior home temperature, and the air quality. We also love that you can program it to open and close during certain times of the day, as well as controlling it through our Google home.
Now as much as we love a good DIY, this one was way out of our wheelhouse. we ended up hiring Roofworks based in Halifax to come down and install. They are a registered installer of Velux and knew exactly what to do. It was actually super refreshing to have them working on our home for the few days. We had just replaced our roof last spring and had a really bad experience with the roofers we had hired. Roofworks on the other hand, showed up clean, professional and were so sweet towards our kids. There's something about a company where the employees show up wearing company merch, proper safety gear and look like they love what they're doing, even though it was the end of October and freezing outside.
Now that we've had the skylights in for about 4 months, we feel comfortable enough to do a full review. Velux, as a brand stands behind the fact that they are a leak-proof Skylight. We have had all of the bad luck when it comes to anything leaking in this house (hence the new roof and lack of chimney on our back fireplace) And we have now gone through many hurricanes and winter storms without one single drop of water coming through the skylights. Not only are we pleased with the quality and the installation, but the back room now let's in so much light even on the stormiest of days. Our lights only get turned on at dark and the kids enjoy the space even more than they had before. It really has changed the entire way we look at and use the family room.
There are still a few things we need to finish up when it comes to the full install, like the automatic blinds. I also would love to use them through the spring and summer before I can give you a full review on the Velux active portion. having installed them right before winter we haven't really had to open the window very much so stay tuned in the fall for a second part to this review. But what I can say and some up right now is adding a skylight to a dark space is 100% worth it if it's a space that your family comes together on a daily basis.
