Why Stow
Old Frames, Small Panes, And A Shutter Built For Both
Stow held on to its farmland longer than most of the towns around it, and the houses that came with the orchards are still standing: farmhouses and center-chimney colonials with six-over-six or twelve-over-twelve sash, wavy glass, and frames that have moved with the sills over the decades. One corner of a window can sit noticeably lower than the other. The casing may not run parallel to the sash anymore.
This is where the gap between a custom shutter and a catalog shutter stops being cosmetic. We measure each opening at the top, the middle, and the bottom, and the panels are made to those numbers. The frame profile, an L, a Z, or a trim hugging style, is picked to meet what your casing actually does, and that gets decided at the house rather than guessed from a form.
Louver size counts just as much on these windows. A 2.5 inch louver keeps the proportion of a small original pane, so the finished shutter reads as period instead of as a modern object in an old room. Hardwood is the usual pick here because it is light, hinges cleanly on a narrow frame, and takes stain when the room has its original woodwork. More on materials and frames is on our shutters page.
The other half of Stow is the newer colonials on former farmland and the houses around Lake Boon and the golf courses. Those have bigger glass and square frames, and they take the 4.5 inch louver. Same panel construction, different proportion. We bring both sizes and hold them against the window before anything gets ordered.
