We, as homeowners, tend to cherish our domestic luxuries. We don’t need that chandelier, but oh, how lovely it is. We don’t need that whirlpool tub, but what a joy it is to melt into at day’s end. Nor do we need fine architectural details, but they are what separate Plain Jane houses from those with character.
Take the interior window. Sure, it would be easier to fill the space with more drywall, but adding one here or there adds punch to an otherwise drab design. Used between rooms or hallways, as transoms, French doors or clerestories, interior windows open rooms to light, connect spaces and, at times, views, allowing you to look from one room through another to the outside. As part of a renovation, adding interior windows can be an easy, cost-effective way to add charm.
The notion of an interior window is nothing new, architects say. “They’re old as the hills, but they’re coming back in remodels and new houses,” says Linda Ritter of Tiburon Homes LLC in Hinsdale.
Dan and Pat Miller of Elgin have them in their 1875 house, although they had to rescue them from layers of paint and from nails that had prevented them from opening.
“Now, they are part of the house’s story,” says Dan of the now-operable transoms that top his bedroom doors.
Devon Polly’s 1910 house, also in Elgin, came with leaded-glass interior windows. Offering views from the front hall into the dining room and living room, they mimic the house’s exterior windows.
Today the interior window is enjoying a renaissance, with architect/author Sarah Susanka leading the way by liberally adding them to her “Not So Big House” designs that are, by definition, smaller but infused with more character. Her books feature all types of interior windows across the house–fixed and operable; casement, sliding, double-hung and transom.
For recent clients, Ritter has installed a double-hung window between a foyer and a living room and transoms over upstairs and downstairs doors. In her own house, Ritter has casement windows between her sunroom and mudroom.
One of Ritter’s clients, Maria Malone in Hinsdale, says she had Ritter add a sunroom to her kitchen but leave the kitchen’s original double-hung windows. “We thought about leaving it open or putting shutters there,” says Malone. “But the windows, which are now inside, give us light and privacy. You can be in the kitchen and not hear conversations out there.”
Architect Cinda Lester of 1212 Architects in Downers Grove says she especially likes to use interior windows in otherwise dark interior rooms such as powder rooms, where she uses opaque glass.
“They bring light from exterior rooms into interior rooms,” she says.
Wendy and Mark Fessler credit their architect, Elissa Morgante in Chicago, for suggesting interior windows when they remodeled their 100-year-old Wilmette house. The windows between their mudroom and kitchen echo the style of their exterior windows, eight panes over one, but are fixed. They allow light to flow into the kitchen while still separating the mudroom and its paraphernalia from the space.
Kim Viehmann of Naperville likes her interior transom windows so much, she asked her builder to repeat them in her new Naperville house.
“We have them over the office and powder-room doors in our old house and will do the same in our new house,” she says. “They add some architectural detail to the plan.”
Viehmann’s builder, Scott Eckstein of James Scott Custom Builders in Naperville, reports that most of his clients want transoms over their first-floor doors, at least. Although operable, awning-style transoms were originally employed in older homes for ventilation, Eckstein explains, now they are usually decorative and non-operable.
Architect Patrick Fortelka of Charles Vincent George Architects in Naperville says interior windows are especially appropriate in Tudor-style and in Craftsman-style houses, where he usually specifies leaded glass.
“They can add a sense of history to a new house without adding much cost to the project,” he says.
St. Charles homeowner Brian Kelly and his wife, Wendy Colby, don’t have a Craftsman-style house but wanted a Craftsman-style window. So they hired glass artist Art Nesser of Arthur Nesser Studio in Algonquin to make a leaded- and stained-glass window to put between their kitchen and family room.
“There used to be a half wall there,” Colby says. “But we enclosed it and put in the window, which is beautiful. It makes the two rooms kind of open and kind of separate.”
Evanston-based builder Al Hatcher skipped the expense of a new window by using a salvaged one when he built Cottage Living magazine’s “Idea House” in Evanston. Now, the refurbished window, which was rescued from the house that used to stand on the same lot, offers a view from the house’s upstairs landing to the stairway. “It gives the house some continuity,” Hatcher says.
Hatcher also built several interior transoms in the Idea House. Now, his client to-do list includes several interior windows, including an art-glass window between a master bedroom and master sitting room and a clear-glass version between a breakfast room and a dining room.
The Idea House’s architect, Michaela Mahady of SALA Architects Inc. in Minneapolis, says interior windows are common in her designs.
“An interior window creates a greater sense of space, especially in a compact house,” she says. “But sometimes it just creates a visual surprise. Then, it’s just fun.”
