I also believe that verticals are outdated, but I'm not sure what's out there that's better.

Vertical blinds say 1980s apartments to me, but maybe that's because I lived in one.

It's not too hard to find durawood or similar faux-wood blinds (horizontal).

I personally like lots of daylight and thus minimal window coverings above a sink (e.g., short fabric valance at most), but this partially depends on your view.

Thank you for your responses...Maybe I could consider putting horizontal wood blinds in front of the two windows in the kitchen and the wood verticals on the slider. Any thoughts about this? (We live in Arizona and while I love to bring in a lot of light, we must have window coverings...unless of course we want the inside of the house to be as hot as the outside!)

We put white plastic verticals in our entire house in 1988 as a "temporary" window covering. We took them down last year when they started cracking. LOL

We looked all over for different window ideas. I like contemporary, and I wanted the panels (like vericals, but wider and can't be turned on an angle), but at the time they were very expensive. We had a plantation shutter guy come out and give us a quote, and it was about the same. One note, I had called Sunburst Shutters first, and then saw a special at Expo. (Calling them myself directly turned out to be the cheaper route.) We decided that these would add value to our home, be beautiful, and easy to take care of. We were right. We love them. We plan to add some dummy curtain panels to the ones in the family room, and the living and dining room.

Our sliders have big panels that slide to either side. They are awesome. We have three panels in the LR, and one in the FR. If you have wall space on either side, you could stack them and have the whole slider open. The only one I don't absolutely love is the one above the sink because he made it an acordian. I don't like the way it opens, but it was the only way to do it because of the cabinets. I just open the slats and I get lots of light. I like no covering over the kitchen window too, but because of privacy and security, I chose this. Splatters just wipe right off. All of the others can open up all the way to either side just like outside shutters.

Here's a picture I took of it the night before our granite install. It shows it the best. Take a look at the morning sunrise.

This is the only view of the kitchen nook.

Here you can see the sliders. They look great with the slats open, or we can open it by sliding one or two panels.

...and for fun, here's my view from my computer right now. It's Florida...it almost always looks like that!

Kristenfl, can you post more about the panels on your sliders? I don't understand how they open. Would it be possible for you to post pictures of them partially and fully open?

We've been searching high and low for some sort of treatment for our sliders that wasn't fabric, or vertical blinds.

Sure! Here you go. They slide freely from one another on a track from above. There is nothing on the bottom. On the one where you see just two panels, you can also open the slats on the one to the left. The other two are together. My shutters are 4 1/2 inches wide with no bar in the middle. The mechanisms are inside. When you point them down, they have them set where you have a little bit of light coming in. If you point them up, they let no light in. Cool, huh?

And yes, they keep out the hot Florida sun. What's also great is that they are guaranteed. We have a long skinny one on our window by the door. It broke and they replaced it with a smile.

Here you can see the track on top.

I tried to post the link to Sunburst, but it rejected it. Here it is
www.sunburstshutters.com/_homepage.asp

I just got rid of my TERRIBLE veritcal blinds on my slidders-I have always hated them and inherited them with the house 2 1/2 years ago-decided to just go with plain panel curtains but considered woven wood vertical panels-have you looked at those? You can then to woven wood roman shades to match on the other windows. I love the way they bring the outdoors in!

Take a look at Hunter Douglas Vignette for sliders. The shade completely disappears into a fabric covered headrail when opened. If you are interested, I can post photos.

Here is a link that might be useful: Hunter Douglas Vignette

Thanks Kristenfl!

Thanks so much for all of your responses. We do have 3 inch shutters in our living, dining room, and bedroom, so I know how wonderful those can be. The slider door option is very interesting, but I'm afraid we just don't have the wall space on either side of the slider to be able to slide those shutters completely out of the way. And I have this thing (one of many I'm afraid...lol...) about getting maximum light in the room, so I'm not sure I would like having part of the panels remain in front of the slider. I will do a little research and maybe call one of our local shutter companies. This is definitely a good lead. I have looked at the Hunter Douglas Vignettes and Vertiglides...Both look great! I am trying to figure out if it's okay to have one kind of window treatment on the sliding glass door (like the Vertiglides) and something a little different on the two kitchen windows...And I definitely don't want to do fabric again on the kitchen window by the sink. That was my stupid mistake to begin with!!

In my previous home we installed a Pella sliding glass door with blinds built in between the glass. We moved seven years later and I can attest to the fact that those blinds stayed straight despite having three children and a dog. And the best thing....not a speck of dust! I'm providing a link, but I didn't think it was the best picture.

Here is a link that might be useful: blinds between the glass

If you click on the link for blinds between the glass choose patio doors, number 6. You see they can be raised, too, allowing for an almost full view.

You're welcome, alku.

I didn't really want these, but they do make ones that fold like an accordian on a track above. My kitchen one just swings freely. I saved a picture awhile back when I was trying to decide what to do. Here it is.

Good luck with whatever you do.