here is a thing i do not understand

[fox]

(I mean. There are many things I don't understand. But some of them I'm not ready to talk about today.)

Say you're building a house. It has the usual things houses have: walls, floors, ceilings. And windows! But it only has windows in some of the exterior walls. That is: if you're going by the outside of the house, one whole wall of the house utterly lacks windows.

I'm seeing more and more of this in new construction lately and I do. not. get it. Anyone want to take a stab at an explanation?

Comments

[reginagiraffe]

Window tax? :D

Are the windowless walls the ones facing the neighbors house? Could it be a privacy thing?

[fox]

Window tax is the most sensible idea I've heard so far. :-P

Distressingly, these are usually houses with plenty of room between them and their neighbors, which is how I'm even able to see the windowless wall from the car, you know? Sometimes it's on a corner lot, where the windowless wall is facing the street that isn't the one giving the house its address. As if the windows were entirely a matter of exterior decoration. Good grief, it is ugly. And it makes me wonder why people don't want ventilation. (Maybe it's easier to insulate when there are fewer windows. But maybe it's moldier, knowwhatImean?) And as for privacy, I have to say, a window with blinds or curtains on it accomplishes privacy without sacrificing as much daylight.

[jae]

I know from having had a house built in the city where I live that there are bylaws that have to do how big a percentage of a wall that is a certain distance from a neighbour's wall is allowed to have windows in it. Apparently it's to reduce the fire-spreading risk. I don't know if that's common in other cities, though.

-J

[fox]

But - I'm not saying the whole thing should be perforated with windows. I'm saying there are houses with not a single window in the whole side of the house. It's like an interior wall on the outside.

[jae]

Maybe they have stricter bylaws there, and if it's a short distance to the neighbour's, they're not allowed to have any windows? Other than that, I got nothin.

-J

[thalia]

Well, I can tell you that our house has windows all over, and it's actually kind of a nuisance, because there's only one place in the family room we can put a television, and it's not where I'd prefer. I suspect the builders are trying to leave some wall space to allow for more flexible room layouts.

If the second floor doesn't have windows on that wall either, I've got nothing.

[fox]

I do know the difficulty of trying to put things on walls when a lot of the wall is taken up with windows. We're going to have some decorating challenges when we finally start putting pictures up. But yeah: these are whole sides of the house where the whole wall is solid. I'm looking at floor plans where the bedrooms have a single window rather than windows in adjacent walls, because one of the walls is on the un-punctured side of the house. Baffling to me.

[thalia]

That is weird. I mean, we have two bedrooms on corners of the house that only have windows on one wall, but that's just to make furniture positioning easier. (And, believe me, it helps.) (Oh, and also, one of those windowless spots has a chimney running up the wall.) But we don't have any sides with no windows whatsoever, and I can't imagine that would be a good look.

This is all reminding me that I really do need to clean windows pretty soon. Ick.

[king_touchy]

Hm. So people can install their murder rooms?

I'm with you. Why would someone make a house like that? I would feel so trapped.

[mrshamill]

It's been common for aaaaaaages. You've been in our house; we have exactly two windows ffacing west and the only one acing east is in the kitchen. I floated the idea that we put a bay window in the dining room, but it would have required extensive renovation to the flooring.

[dragonfly]

Energy efficiency. If you live in a warm climate, west and east facing windows can heat the house more than is needed just for the light. In a cold climate, that solar heating won't offset the fact that glass, even double-paned, will never have the R-value of a well-insulated wall, so the more windows, the more opportunity for heat to radiate out in the cold season. It's all a trade-off.

When they built the new construction houses, they may have done software modeling based on where the wind comes from or the angle of the sun. If it's truly off-putting, then the architect didn't do a good job. But if you get a 15% improvement in your power usage for a windowless wall that you don't mind, because it's where you intended to put your mongo entertainment center, then it's all good.

[fox]

I hear what you're saying. And 15% is a lot. On the other hand ... sick building syndrome, man. I keep thinking some air flow in all directions is good for you. (And I live in a very warm climate. In a swamp, in fact. My power bills in the summer can be three times what they were in the spring. Still.) But - I also really think it looks so ugly on the outside. Even if the house is healthy and spore-free and 15% greener and that's where the gigantor TV goes, I think I'd say jesus put a couple of faux windows on the outside just for appearances. :-}

[dragonfly]

Well, I pulled 15% out of the air, but I have no doubt careful calculations have gone into balancing the trade-offs.

[marahmarie]

I wonder if your swamp is anywhere near mine? (There's actually one in the yard here, but I'm on eight acres so there's forest, too). I hear you on the summer power bills. For us too the A/C is on 24/7 and yeah, there goes any discretionary spending. I feel like I need to take out a loan to buy dental floss or anything else even sort of "unnecessary" this time of year.

(Also, have gone from the apt. with three windows - where the power bills were even more killer than the ones I'm dealing with now - described in my other comments to a house with, omg, let me think...14 of them here, and some of them take up entire walls, while the rest are floor to ceiling, and...power bills are still pretty killer - but extra fresh air, especially on cooler morning/evenings is a nice benefit, regardless.)

[marahmarie]

Builders are cheap. Windows (glass, casement, framing them out, related construction/material costs) are expensive. In my former hometown the place I shared with my roommate had three windows. Three. One in the living room (actually those were double sliding glass doors), one in each bedroom, and that was it. Thank God for white paint or I would've lost my mind, but no window in the bathroom was almost insufferable and no window in the kitchen almost equally so. In the same town I also lived in places both newer and older than that (an apt. about 20 years old, in Florida) with many more windows. One place had 18 of them (you should see the curtains I own - enough of them to hang in three houses with average amounts of windows and have plenty of curtains left over). So to me it must be the less windows = the cheaper the builder and/or overall construction and/or overall budget for building project as set by the owner.

[meara]

Yeah, I was going to go with "cheap" as an answer as well. I've seen it on some construction in Seattle, and it's never on the "oh this wall is three feet from the neighbors" wall, it's so weird.

[marahmarie]

The thing was, the apartment had walls that were wide open for windows (and without causing any privacy violations), just as fox describes, that lacked them anyhow. My bedroom had such a wall and so did my roommate's. The bathroom, unfortunately, was wedged in so that the only place to put a window would be over the shower (still better than no window at all, but not the best place for a window, either). The kitchen was wedged in even worse, so that there was no possibility for anything except, say, a skylight above there. The place was well-constructed otherwise but the kitchen was just a hole-in-the-wall, the bathroom was pretty bare bones, and the walls? You didn't even need a hammer to nail them. I would just press the nails in with my hands. All signs of cheap, if you ask me.

[lexin]

The building fashion in the UK seems to be for tiny windows, but lots of them. No, I don't know why.