Look Book Issue 3 | Be Well 20/20 | Mechoshades
MECHOSHADES
Maintaining natural daylight within a building is extremely beneficial to its occupants. Controlling natural light can be tricky. There is a fine balance. We reached out to Mary lovely, CIC Project Manager Specialist for Window Treatments, and asked her to share more on the value of daylight within an interior environment and how a product like Mecho Shade can help mitigate distractions caused by too much natural light and create lighting synergy.
Natural daylight is a highly desirable contribution to almost all interior environments but it does need careful consideration and proper planning. The right kind of window treatments can harness daylight to meet a variety of spatial needs. Solar shades can be used to control direct and indirect sunlight for effective internal lighting that maximizes visual comfort and reduces energy use.
One of the best attributes of a solar roller window shade is maintaining views while blocking glare. You can actually still see out when the shade is down, which promotes a more ideal living condition. According to WELL, our natural circadian rhythms can be thrown off by under exposure to natural light – which effects sleep, digestion and alertness. Mecho offers a full spectrum of neutral cloth colors to coordinate with any interior with varying percentages of openness. Window treatments impact heat gain and the thermal comfort of the occupants of the room. There are a couple things to consider when selecting a shade cloth. Lighter color fabrics will reflect the sun, decreasing the heat load on a building, but do not do as much for glare control. Darker fabrics will absorb more of the heat from the sun but will do a better job reducing glare – which is why it is easier to see out of a darker cloth. Selecting a cloth in grey range is more of a happy medium. Mecho offers a range of shade control options – from manual operation all the way to highly sophisticated automated systems that track with the sun. Whatever or wherever the space, there is a Mecho daylighting solution. Also, during our current Covid-19 days, cleaning is ever more on the minds of designers, building owners, maintenance teams…well just about everyone. As an added bonus, roller window shades are very easy to clean. I would take a roller shade over a mini-blind any day!
Hospitals have a variety of daylighting control needs to provide light and thermal comfort to their patients and staff. In this article, Parkland Memorial Hospital, Mecho partnered with the hospital and design team to create a system that works for their needs today and for the future.
Written By: Mary Lovely, Commercial Installation & Construction
Scott Rice would like to introduce CIC’s Project Manager Specialist for Window Treatments, Mary Lovely. Mary studied Interior Architecture and Product Design at Kansas State University. She joined the CIC team in January of this year. CIC, Commercial Installation and Construction, engages in a range of construction projects from interior painting to full tenant build-outs. Mary primarily focuses on projects involving Mecho Roller window shades. Mecho is the industry leader for commercial solar shading.
For more information on Mechoshades, reach out to Mary, Maryl@ciconstruct.com
Project Manager
Commercial Installation & Construction
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