Shutter restoration and repair
Most London houses built before 1900 still have their original window shutters, folded into the reveal and painted shut.
We free them without damage, repair the panels, hinges and bars, refinish them and make them fold and fasten again. Where shutters are missing we make replicas to the original panel pattern, and rebuild the shutter box where it has been lost.
London · ShuttersWritten quotationsA studio of The Barnsbury Group, established 1980
What we do
- Free painted-shut shutters without damage
- Repair split panels and loose mouldings
- Replace missing hinges, knobs and shutter bars with period-correct ironmongery
- Rebuild shutter boxes and panelled reveals
- Make new shutters to match
- Finish by hand
Georgian shutters
Georgian shutters are panelled to match the room's joinery and fold back into splayed reveals in two or three leaves a side. The panels are thin, the stiles narrow, and the mouldings run with the window architrave, so a repair that is slightly off shows immediately. On the taller Georgian windows there is often a lower set rising from the sill as well, worked by a sliding bar. We repair these in situ wherever we can.
Victorian shutters
Victorian shutters are generally heavier, with thicker panels and simpler mouldings, and often a single fold each side into a square reveal. The common failures are the hinges, which were never sized for a century of paint, and the knuckle where the leaves meet. Later Victorian houses sometimes have shutters only on the ground floor, or none at all where the builder economised.
Freeing shutters that have been painted shut
This is most of the work. Decades of paint seals the leaves to each other and to the reveal, and forcing them splits the panels. We score the joints, soften and strip the paint where it has bridged, free each leaf in turn, then repair whatever the paint was hiding. Expect to find split panels, missing or seized hinges, lost knobs and bars, and in older houses a shutter box that has been boarded over.
Refinishing
Shutters are interior joinery and are finished accordingly: stripped back where the build-up has lost the moulding detail, filled, primed and hand-painted, or waxed and polished where the original was never painted. We match the room's existing joinery.
Replicas and missing shutters
Where shutters have gone, we make new ones to the original panel pattern, taken from a surviving shutter elsewhere in the house or from the window's proportions where none survives. These are made by Barnsbury Joinery, our group's manufacturing studio, and fitted by the same team that surveyed the window. Where the shutter box itself has been removed, it is rebuilt before the shutters go back.
Why working shutters are worth having
They insulate better than most secondary glazing, they add security at ground level, and they are part of what makes a period room read as original.
Consent
Repairing or reinstating internal shutters does not need planning permission. In a listed building, internal joinery is covered by the listing, so replacing or significantly altering shutters can need listed building consent. We advise at the survey.
Common questions
My shutters have been painted shut for decades, can they be saved?01
Usually, yes. We free them without damaging the panels, repair split panels, hinges and bars, and make them fold and fasten again.
Can you make new shutters where there are none?02
Yes. We make replicas to the original panel pattern, matched to any shutters that survive elsewhere in the house, and rebuild the shutter box and panelled reveal where needed.
Do shutters need consent?03
Repairing original shutters is maintenance and does not usually need consent. In a listed building the interior is protected as well as the exterior, so new shutters or a rebuilt shutter box may need listed building consent; we advise at the survey.
Do you repair shutters without doing the windows?04
Yes. Shutters are quoted separately and can be done on their own, though doing both while the room is already dust-sheeted usually works out better.
Book a survey
Send us photographs of your windows and we'll tell you what needs doing and what doesn't, with a written quotation. The digital survey is free.