If I were to sit down with you I'd ask this; Do you want a good window, professionally installed or do you want the lowest price? A good window, professionally and properly installed will never be the lowest or *best* priced option. Be very careful that you don't buy a quality window that is improperly installed, OR, that you buy a low quality window accompanied by a poor installation. Nightmares begin soon thereafter. What are you considering? Vinyl or wood? Michael

Yes, that's part of our dilemma... people seem to do just about everything (leading me to think it probably doesn't matter if we change from what's here!) and there are very few original Dutch Colonials in our 300+ year old town (plenty of old saltboxes and traditional colonials, but no "old" Dutch colonials and only a smattering of 20th century ones, those mostly builder models that have a gambrel roof and dormers but that's as far as the similarity goes. Someone told me the other day, when I asked the same question about architectural "integrity" of the window style, "well, if yours was built in 1959, it's pretty much a fraud already, isn't it?" :) Which is true, of course, so perhaps I just shouldn't sweat it. The increased light (from going to lower sashes with no divided lites) would be welcome, and we don't DISLIKE the look from the street -- we just weren't sure if others would find it an odd look. Most people (including realtors and the town assessor) refer to it as a "Cape" but I think that's primarily because from the street, it resembles one, with its dormers and low roof line. But from the end of the house, where you see the curved flare of the very deep eaves, the gambrel roofline, the chimney centered on the end of the house, it is clearly a Dutch colonial. So mostly, I just wondered if there was any sort of standard for the window style, or if the pragmatic Dutch did whatever was (a) cost effective and (b) practical for a given site (and I should do the same!)

There is some atrocious advice being given here regarding the performance and longevity of replacement windows. A quality product will last 3 decades at minimum, and bring substantial improvements in energy efficiency, functionality, sound mitigation, etc. There are terrible products on the market to be sure, but lumping all new windows in with the lowest common denominator is incorrect, and poor logic... That being said, I would probably agree with the ultimate recommendation of some of the others, and that would be to perform some restoration work on these units. That is assuming that there is historical relevance to the home (sounds like that is the case), where changing out windows and other updates would be detrimental to the value of the home. If you were inclined to replace the windows regardless, there is no reason to move away from double hungs despite the size, and something that offers a similar look would be best.

Your house is very cute and I wdon't I'll avoid anything that would change the look of that from porch to not-quite-house. NO PLASTIC. Storm windows, just to respond to other comments are an energy efficient way of not t throwing out beautiful long-lasting original windows and replacing with crap that will be in a landfill in a few years. Look for windows that are meant for 3 season porches not insulated interiors. -lots of people have them near our cabin in Maine, turn It in to a screened porch in the summer.