Maria Killam | Classic and Timeless Colour

My Mom’s Beautiful Sunroom Reveal; Before & After

Posted: 02 Aug 2021 10:31 AM PDT

Today I’m sharing the exterior reveal of my mom’s new sunroom. This lovely new extension on her carriage house is the perfect solution to our west coast rainy seasons. See all the before and afters, plus see how landscaping took this exterior from ‘meh’ to fabulous!

Thank you for your patience… See those grasses waving in front of my Mom’s new sunroom? Well, I was waiting for them to grow before I had it photographed so I could share it here!

I have three of these tall grasses in front of my own patio and one beside my design studio. If you’re looking for a plant that grows tall every season, this is the one. In March, I had my gardeners cut chunks from the five plants I have and we transplanted them over here. They will get bigger each year as perennials tend to do.

The three apple trees on the right side of the property create a little privacy from my Sisters backyard (below):

Sunroom before landscaping

Here’s what the deck looked like before:

It was very basic, just a platform that was too small and had zero protection from the southwest sun. This deck was rarely used except as an entry to go back and forth from my sister’s backyard. My mom wanted a sheltered place to relax outdoors with some protection for the rainy weather.

Thanks to my lovely readers’ generous advice, we realized we needed to add a proper foundation to build a sunroom on. So, we traded this old deck for a larger one that was the same height as the inside floors. Then we added glass walls and a roof to create a sunroom.

Here’s a look at the sunroom exterior before the landscaping was installed:

My Mom has four septic tank covers all across the front side of her sunroom (below).

I’m showing you a second photo because it’s good to notice how uninspiring this looks WITHOUT the landscaping.

I talk about this in the landscaping module in my Exterior Masterclass training AND in our eDesign department all day long.

Too many people spend way too much money adding unnecessary stone and other cladding on their exterior without realizing how important landscaping is. Landscaping is often what is truly missing from a home – and helps take it from ‘meh’ to fabulous.

Sunroom after landscaping

As always, MaryAnne White (my virtual landscape designer) came to the rescue. Last Fall, I sent a few photos to MaryAnne and she sent me a drawing of what the garden bed curves should look like.

It looked so much better even without all the plant material installed! You can see that three of the septic tank covers were covered up by the beds. One more to go.

You can see my sisters home on the right (below). It was originally white vinyl siding with forest green accents. That’s why I chose white 10 years ago for my Moms carriage house when it was built.

My Mom has wanted this sunroom for a few years now. We get so much rain in the west coast–even in the summer–and our nights are always cool. Even when the room is baking on a summer afternoon, by the evening it’s cool again. And, even I can’t hang out on my open deck from about 2:00 pm onwards during the hottest time of the day.

We have spent many enjoyable mornings having coffee with my sisters in this bright and cheerful space (the interior reveal is coming next).

Here’s the after:

I like the black trim around the roofline of the sunroom because it creates a nice extension of the black roof.

And, here’s the side view of the deck before:

And here’s the after:

Sunroom by Elite Solariums

Pink is my Mom’s favourite colour. She already had these pink hydrangeas growing haphazardly in her vegetable garden so we just moved them over here! It was nice to have some more mature-looking plant material to instantly make the beds look good.

Need a smart way to hide your septic tank covers, electrical boxes, etc? Faux rocks are the answer, you can get them here.

The french doors are on the main entry side facing my sister’s home. This was before the landscaping:

I was happy to find a large conical boxwood shrub that will also look nice in the winter sitting beside the entry (below):

Here’s a sneak peak of the inside. I’ll post the sunroom interior next because I want to talk about how I created that lattice wall, which truly makes this room!