The DIY Project that “Hides Your Neighbor’s Windows”

In case anyone has ever wondered, during times when I don’t post in awhile, if I’ve run out of stuff to write about, well, the answer is “No.”

I’ve got so many posts half-written and filed away — with many of them now obsolete to even post — I could probably upload something every day for at least 6 months straight. But as a stringent procrastinator, that will not happen.

A project I’ve been wanting to share for awhile involved windows, paper and white paint. However, I needed to post a prior project I did — one of those filed away — as sort of a precursor, to the new one. Why? Because the latest project was an extension of the prior project. Confused? Me too. So, let’s move on to a well-known DIY privacy window project that I did AND actually worked! (I say “actually worked” because I’ve seen this done online, but it was usually someone posting pics from some other website and not something they actually tried themselves.)

Before moving to Tennessee, we lived in the middle of the city in Manchester, NH. Our next door neighbor’s house was literally one car’s length away from our little bungalow. And the only room where his windows directly looked into ours from both his first and second floors, was the dining room. I also need to add that we called our neighbor “Fun Boy.” So, for reasons that you may conjure up about someone deserving of that nick-name, we always kept our blinds half-closed…

This made the room quite annoyingly dark. And I was tired of being annoyed so I went to our local surplus store and scored some clear Con-Tact Paper and try out this DIY privacy film I’ve seen numerous times online. And instead of giving you play-by-play, I’m only showing pics to verify to y’all that it really works.

So here’s a closeup of a couple of the neighbor’s windows and the Clear Con-Tact paper I used.

Wiped the window down with a mixture of water and regular dish detergent, and placed an already cut piece of film to a portion of the window. If you wet it enough, you can easily slide it into place if it’s a little crooked. (You can also see the other large window with a view straight into Fun Boy’s living room…)

Don’t worry about all the bubbles and stuff that are trapped under the film. Simply work it out by sliding a credit card from the center, outward. (I tried other scrapers and they were too rigid and put marks into the film. The credit card honestly worked the best!)

Also let it dry a little too. If it’s humid out, there may be more moisture than usual underneath that doesn’t seem to come out. But it will eventually dry. Just make sure there are no bubbles at all.

Above shows the window with no film and sections with film so you can see the effect. Exactly what I was looking for! And below was our dining room where we were able to lift up those blinds completely and let tons of light in!

I say “was” our dining room because we sold this house, only nine days after we listed it! We were very lucky.

And Mr. Basketmaker stressed that I let y’all know that this picture above was taken immediately after we staged it for our first, and only, open house with the realtor. A more accurate picture would have shown this table covered with a couple stacks of papers, a few books, a magazine or two, junk mail from the last few weeks, probably the missing remote Eric always misplaced, a glass or two, or three depending on how lazy I was being…. you get the gist.

comments