How We Used Colored Window Film On Birdie’s Windows – Spoiler: It Was A Super Fast, Cheap, And Easy DIY

Last summer, while at the famously neutral mountain house, Birdie and I had, let’s just say a “debate” about my use of color. She was fearful that my taste/style was rather boring. I really understood but I wanted to reassure her that I still got it (hilarious that I was desperate to prove to my 7-year-old that I can do “young” and “fun”). So I went on the internet and showed her a few of the past rooms that she hadn’t seen, including the Ban.do office – full of disco balls and colorful window film and she squealed with delight. It reminded both of us how much fun color can be and while her room was already dripping with a lot of it, I agreed that putting colorful films on the diamond pattern of her windows would be so fun (and so easily removable should it be “too much”).

As you can see the room has the most beautiful vintage windows, shaky glass and all. And while the room didn’t need more color, there was certainly an opportunity to take it up a notch and ensure that my now 8-year-old thinks I’m “the coolest, forever” (her words, not mine and she pinky swore).

So I ordered WAYYYY too much, mostly because on the internet when they were all rolled up I couldn’t tell what they would really look like.

Blue | Yellow | Pink | Green

So I ordered yellow, teal, hot pink, and green (along with some opaque ones that just looked like weird floral privacy glass).

The whole thing was pretty easy besides making sure that the squares and triangles measurements were perfect (shout out to Gretchen for helping with that).

It’s honestly the simplest process – you just need a spray bottle of water and a squeegee. You spray the window and then place the film which attaches itself immediately. Then squeegee out the excess water, spreading it around evenly. Catch the excess water with a towel and then move on to the next. So obviously if you don’t have the grids or don’t have, say 114-year-old windows with no real 90 degrees, then it would be easier 🙂

It was so easy I clearly was taking a nap while installing on camera. Anyone can do it! In your sleep!

And there you have it (and she LOVES IT). Now the ONLY downside to this, which I didn’t notice til we were done is that window you see above, is that they are double-sided and you can also see these colored windows from the outside. So when you are driving up it looks like three windows are stained glass in non-historic pastel colors. I don’t really care because we live very off of a neighborhood road, but I suppose if our house faced the front in a neighborhood it could look weird. Again, because it’s so easy to remove I’m not worried about it (but it is screwing up my fantasy of wreathing all our windows, which I fear might just need to happen next year anyway).

*Photos by Kaitlin Green