How to Make an Enclosed Patio Feel Like a Room

Cover the Windows

• Install curtain rods on all the windows or screened areas and add either lined curtains or regular curtains with liners to block light and sound. Whether the patio enclosures are screens or glass, there’s less material to block out sounds from outside and more space for light to shine through. The liners provide a thicker layer to help block these out and make the patio seem quieter. If the patio enclosures are screens only, consider switching them out for glass enclosures to protect the items inside the patio from exterior weather.

Security

• Shore up the locks on any sliding windows and the door to the patio. As you treat the patio more and more like a regular room, you might start leaving things in it that you want to ensure are still there when you next go into the enclosed patio. Add a deadbolt to the exterior door and thumb or pin locks to any windows that open.

Furniture

• Place a couch, armchairs, a coffee table or a writing desk in the patio. AZCentral.com notes companies make furniture sets that look like comfortable cloth-covered living room pieces, but the fabric is treated so that it is weather-resistant. If you use patio furniture that is obviously meant to be outside -- for example, plastic, wicker or wrought iron -- it will make the room look either like a patio with curtains or a living room with cheap patio furniture instead of indoor furniture.

Walls

• Decorate the walls of the enclosed patio with posters, paintings and other wall hangings. Outdoor patios don’t normally have these, but indoor rooms do -- adding them to the enclosed patio further helps the illusion that you’re in one of the regular inside rooms of the house.

Purpose

• Assign an actual purpose to the patio. If you leave it as a little-used patio where you occasionally hang out, you won’t develop a familiarity with it and it will still feel different from the rest of the house. If you designate it as a study, living room or even a summer bedroom and you spend a lot of time there, it will feel more like a room in your home.