I live in one of those neighbourhoods where every house was built with a very similar plan, with only minor changes from house to house. My next-door neighbour’s place was built by taking the floor plan or our house and mirroring it. This had the consequence of lining up our big kitchen window with their big kitchen window, with a few small feet of space in between.
At first this wasn’t a problem. They kept their blinds closed 24/7, and we enjoyed the sunlight through our window. Suddenly, that changed. Their blinds were open, and we had a war on our hands. We couldn’t close our blinds or we would lose. They apparently felt the same.
The final blow in this war was dealt by my neighbour, or more specifically, his exposed buttocks. They were all skinny and hairy and poking out from under a hockey jersey. War over. You win, Lorne. You win.
I didn’t want to lose the sunlight in the kitchen, so I purchased some cheap window privacy film from Ebay. This was carefully cut into measured rectangles to simulate a window frame, giving a tiny bit of creativity and class to what could potentially be a tacky decoration. I then taped some pieces of twine to the window frame to set up guides for the film placement.
Place it up on the window roughly where you want it and use a squeegee to press out as much of the glass cleaner and air bubbles as you can. The piece should still be able to float around to fine tune the placement. When you’re happy with the placement, grab a hair dryer on the hottest setting and heat that sucker up. Pay special attention to the edges, and force down any voids or air bubbles as they peel up from the edges.
The end result looks like this:
I’m pretty happy with it. I would probably have gone for more coverage of the window but I ran out of material. With the blinds down, it looks a million times better than my neighbour’s hairy ass.
Cost Breakdown:
$20 - 5ft adhesive window privacy film (ebay)
$5 - foaming glass cleaner
==$25
Incidental costs:
tape
twine
At first this wasn’t a problem. They kept their blinds closed 24/7, and we enjoyed the sunlight through our window. Suddenly, that changed. Their blinds were open, and we had a war on our hands. We couldn’t close our blinds or we would lose. They apparently felt the same.
The final blow in this war was dealt by my neighbour, or more specifically, his exposed buttocks. They were all skinny and hairy and poking out from under a hockey jersey. War over. You win, Lorne. You win.
I didn’t want to lose the sunlight in the kitchen, so I purchased some cheap window privacy film from Ebay. This was carefully cut into measured rectangles to simulate a window frame, giving a tiny bit of creativity and class to what could potentially be a tacky decoration. I then taped some pieces of twine to the window frame to set up guides for the film placement.
The trick to putting on any big stickers is to use something to keep it wet and slippery while you place it. Some use a soap and water solution, or alcohol and water, I find that foaming glass cleaner works well. Peel off the backing, making sure that anywhere you touch the sticky part is covered in the glass cleaner (so your hands don’t stick to it), then spray a light coating of cleaner over the whole piece.
Place it up on the window roughly where you want it and use a squeegee to press out as much of the glass cleaner and air bubbles as you can. The piece should still be able to float around to fine tune the placement. When you’re happy with the placement, grab a hair dryer on the hottest setting and heat that sucker up. Pay special attention to the edges, and force down any voids or air bubbles as they peel up from the edges.
The end result looks like this:
I’m pretty happy with it. I would probably have gone for more coverage of the window but I ran out of material. With the blinds down, it looks a million times better than my neighbour’s hairy ass.
Cost Breakdown:
$20 - 5ft adhesive window privacy film (ebay)
$5 - foaming glass cleaner
==$25
Incidental costs:
tape
twine
No comments:
Post a Comment