Living in California (at least part of the year!) means lots of sun almost year round. Some patios are even hot and sunny in the winter here! Depends on the orientation, house walls blocking wind or adjacent structures reflecting heat, but its pretty common. So its handy to have a ready area of shade for most patios unless overhanging trees give good shade.
We have even installed patio covers because of trees! The dropage of a live oak or silk tree is no joke. They can drop quite a bit just in one day.
Photos to follow
There are some various solutions to adding shade to patios. The most common and movable is an umbrella. A prefabricated item that is movable and of varied cost. Umbrellas normally need a base-
also movable and should be sized to the diameter of the umbrella. The downfall of the umbrella is the small area of shade and the center pole. Manufacturers have worked on this quite a bit and now they have something called a cantilevered umbrella. I call them hanging umbrellas because when they are down they hang off the overhead arm of this type of umbrella (see photo). These types of umbrellas can be large- 10-13′ and don’t have a center pole but instead have an overhead arm, as I mentioned, that the canopy hangs from. They have a very large base so we often put a sleeve in the patio/an ground tube to inset the pole and avoid the base.
Best to put you umbrella down in winds and store inside or in shed for the winter.
Most can be tilted to help with afternoon setting sun. Many have lights in them which is a great feature. The canopies of best quality Umbrellas are made from Sunbrella fabric. Big box stores carry umbrellas of many types. You can get a good quality type from Frontgate, Patio World, American Leisure Patio or similar high end dealers.
Another popular item for patio shade has been the shade sail. This is a triangle of Sunbrella fabric mounted to the home or posts and tensioned to not sag. These have a nice contemporary look, are fairly affordable and can be taken down in winter. They are available from awning companies and online. They can overlap and most are custom made so if you want to play with the shape that is possible.
I think it is best to run a vinyl coated cable to eye bolts in wall or post and put a tensioner on the cable. hang the sail from the eye bolts too and use cables to give extra points of clipping sail edges.
This also allows you to string lights on the cables as desired.
These can be quite large and with multiples you can cover a lot of area. They are also a good temporary solution until trees fill in for shade, or as noted above to protect patio from tree droppings.
The next option for shade is a retractable awning. These are mounted above the doors and windows on the house walls or on top of the eave on the roof. The biggest advantages that I can see of an awning is the absence of posts. Arbors have posts that can impede layout of furniture on a patio so not having posts is helpful. I also like the ability to roll out the awning a few feet or all the way.
This allows light into the rooms. Awnings now have bending arms much like our elbows. The awnings can go out to 12-14′. The distributor can provide the width on the house wall as needed for
coverage. Some folks don’t like the look of them so you need to decide for yourself. The awnings should be retracted in wind and winter. The have a housing on the wall for winter. They are available as electric or manual. Save yourself some money and get the manual so you don’t need to replace the motor.
In my business we built a lot of Arbors- also know as trellis’, pergolas, or patio covers.
They are normally custom built on site from wood but not always. Some are prefabricated kits and vinyl and metal are also available for awnings. A traditional Arbor is a slatted wood roof that lets
air circulate. They can be natural wood i.e. Cedar or Redwood sealed or douglas fir if the wood is not in contact with soil.
Do not leave as raw wood due to the UV and weather deterioration- Arbors become unsightly and wear out quickly if left untreated.
Pressure treated wood should not be used as it doesn’t accept seal or paint, and is also not good quality or good looking.
Folks have become very fond of having solid roofs outside so sometimes we will use flat plastic sheeting on top (from Tap Plastics or other distributor). These sheets aren’t really visible and do not yellow. They are translucent. The arbor should have a slight pitch for drainage. There are still some fiberglass wavy patio cover panels around or the aluminium version but that’s pretty dated.
Prefabricated kits can be good if the materials are sturdy and good quality. Keep in mind all arbors should have anchors drilled into the patio or set with a pier when the patio is built. An arbor can be tipped by strong winds, people hanging things on them or other action.
There are codes and conditions set on placement of arbors in yards by the city and usually require a permit so be forewarned.
labels and notes below photos
Arbor kit with sliding awning cloth shades
Typical Redwood Arbor stain-sealed in a dark walnut color
Small Arbor will have a vine growing over it for shade
Cool Umbrella with flat side to set against a wall
Typical Umbrella in a table- pretty small for that table!
Shade Sails supported to steel posts. These give afternoon shade to this area
Nice example of alternate shapes for these Shade Sails
Quite a few commercial properties use these. Good example of mounting to building and posts.
Retractable Awning with good coverage
This photo shows the support arms of the retractable awning
This is known as an “eyebrow” awning or window shade. Helpful for those hot windows!\
Solid Roofed Patio cover (sometimes called a gazebo)- Costco has a similar one too
Wavy fiberglass panels keep out rain but are kind of a dated look. Nice Arbor
Some homes have a lot of trouble with the setting sun in the home and patio. This look like its on
a manufactured home but is one solution. We use outdoor drop blinds on Arbors to do the same thing.
Example of a vinyl arbor. This one may have opening and shutting louvers as the roof.
An Australian Company markets their louvered arbors in the U.S. and they are at a lot of
home shows- theirs have metal louvers.
Hope these notes on shade structures are of some help. Its one of those items that makes the patio
easier to use in Summer and helps us avoid the direct sun and protect our skin and eyes.
On my projects there is usually multiple solutions we can use and we narrow it down by look, cost, maintenance and space.
One last photo of a cantilevered umbrella- this one is 13′. They come with the valence on the edge or without. The Umbrella pictures were taken at American Leisure Patio in San Jose (they have multiple locations).
Wondering if you can draw a plan for a shade structure or arbor for a contractor or yourself to follow? Maybe you need more help and have a whole garden to layout. I offer a landscape design course through this website. A written guide with lots of photos and sample plans to help guide you through the process of preparing a plan and getting started with the installation. Check it out-
