SoHo Motorized Shades
In the 1962 play A Thousand Clowns, Jason Robards’ character explains his philosophy in life by speaking of a small car pulling up to a circus and “1,000 clowns” get out. That is an impressive number of clowns! Three years later, the movie 101 Dalmatians stole the hearts of millions. That’s an impressive number of puppies! In a more recent event, AP Shades, based in Queens, installed 64 motorized shades to cover over 100 windows in Manhattan. That is a very impressive number of automatically-controlled window shades!
Some of the windows had a vertically-split frame, and the client requested one shade across both windows. To achieve this part of the immense project, we had to reverse-roll the shades and install them as close to the front of the window as possible. A fascia was added at the top to conceal the shade when rolled up and offer a clean look along with the illusion that each shade resides inside a pocket.
Lutron is an industry leader in motorized shades and lighting controls, having started in a makeshift lab right here in the Big Apple in the 1950s. These shades can be fully integrated with other smart technology. But wonderfully-designed and meticulously-manufactured shades are beautiful, contemporary and functional only when installed by an experienced team. Precision at every step must assure that the shades are secure, level, operational, uniform and consistent. AP Shades took on this colossal, complicated, challenging project, found it far more satisfying and successful than trying to corral 101 Dalmatian puppies or deal with 1,000 clowns.