Hooked on… sunrooms

Weeeehooo!!! It’s Friday!!!!! :-)

And that means Julia at Hooked on Houses is hosting her weekly blog party, Hooked on Fridays! It’s  fun to visit all the Hooked on Fridays participants and check out what everybody is loving this week…

What I’m hooked on this Friday is sunrooms — also called patio rooms, solariums, conservatories, patio enclosures, or Florida Rooms. I like sunroom because it’s short and easy to spell ;-) And also because it best describes what a sunroom is to me — a room filled with sun :-) Well, except for when it’s raining. But that’s a great time to enjoy a sunroom too — when the weather is uncooperative. Or when the mosquitoes are out looking for a snack. You feel like your outside, but you’re not getting wet or bitten :-)

History

I found all sorts of information about when and where the first conservatories were built. Unfortunately, each source names different dates and countries.

According to Oak Conservatories, it’s likely that the first glass pavilions were built in France in 1385 to house flowers. The establishment of the European Botanical Gardens in 1544 at the University of Pisa and in 1545 at Padua, coupled with the growth in botanical studies and the age of exploration, encouraged the beginnings of orangeries and protected gardening. The Dutch built orangeries in the 16th century, and the English built orangeries soon after that.

One of the most famous British orangeries is the Queen Anne Orangery, built in the early 1700s. It was designed so that the citrus trees could be rolled out onto the terrace during good weather, and then rolled back into the orangery during bad weather.

Modern sunrooms

Today, sunrooms are mainly built as rooms for living in. They’re usually made of aluminium, PVC, or timber with tempered glass walls and roofs.

Sunrooms come in all shapes and sizes and styles. They’re typically attached to a house, but some sunrooms are free-standing…

Love this brick one with the copper roof — reminds me of an old post office, for some reason. Check out the beautiful wood detailing on the inside…

I suppose this one is really a pool house, but it’s so pretty that I have to include it here :-)

Some sunrooms have a dome….

A sunroom roof can be solid, but it’s usually glass to let in lots of light…

Some sunrooms are glass all the way around….

 

And some have just a glass roof. At least you can walk around naked in this one if the mood strikes ;-)

This one isn’t exactly a sunroom, it has great skylights…

How about this sunroom — glass all the way around!!

A sunroom on a red brick house…

…and a sunroom on a stone house…

                       

I don’t know where this stone house is, but I bet the views from the sunroom are spectacular!!

Another sunroom with a beautiful copper roof and wood interior. Not a bad chandelier either!!

 

Is it wrong to have sunroom envy??

And finally, Brooke from Velvet & Linen and her husband, Steve, have this beautiful sunroom…

*Sigh*  Yep, I definitely have sunroom envy!!

After you’re done soaking up some rays here, head on back to Hooked on Houses to see what everyone else is hooked on this week :-)

Unless otherwise noted, all pictures from:

Trombe (UK)

Tanglewood Conservatories (Maryland, USA)