Premium High Quality Poplar Louvered Wood Shutters
Timeless Exterior Wood Shutters
Our millwork techniques have been perfected over the years, allowing us to provide you with high-quality, premium wood shutters. Our shutters are available in a wide variety of styles, patterns and woods, and can easily be tailored to the exact specifications that you require. Specializing in Spanish Cedar, our expertly crafted custom wood shutters give any building an historic, elegant touch.
Estate Millwork Custom Wood Shutter Process
Our specialty in custom wood shutter production allows us to take any type or style of shutter and modify it to your window’s exact specifications. Our combination of time-tested techniques in a modern facility is what lets us create the perfect custom shutter, with styles including louvered, raised panel, flat panel, Bermuda, combination and board/batten.
First, you will need to specify measurements for each shutter (see guide below). Once we receive your request, we should be able to come back with a same-day quote, depending on the amount of custom work you’re looking for. Once all the paperwork has been taken care of, you should see your final product within 3-4 weeks.
Measuring for Exterior Wood Shutters
An accurate measurement for your shutters is a key part of the process, and while it may seem like a difficult task, our tips will help make measuring a breeze.
First, you’ll need to measure for shutter width. Using a measure or yardstick, measure your window’s width at the top, bottom and middle. Record your measurement in inches to the nearest 1/16th of an inch, and always take down the smallest number. If you’re measuring a window that needs two shutters, the number you take down will be your pair width, and if it only requires one shutter it will be your shutter width. Also, if you want your shutters to open and close subtract 1/2 an inch from the overall width, otherwise your wood shutters will be for decorative purposes only.
Second, you will need to account for shutter height. Record the height in inches from the windowsill to the very top position of the window. Also, for operable shutters, subtract the 1/4 an inch from the overall height. Do this for every window, and your home will be ready for a custom wood shutter makeover!
Wood Shutter Features
- Long-Lasting Hardwood Shutters
- Classic American Shutter Styles
- Sustainable Lumber Production Process
- Custom Fitted Exterior Wood Shutters
- Responsive Customer Service
- Generations of Shutter Expertise
- Premium Millwork Procedures
Estate Millwork Exterior Wood Shutter Advantages
We strive to be the most efficient, highest quality millworker in the industry. Our commitment to excellence means you will never have to worry about the durability or lifetime of your shutters, as we only use top-grade solid lumber in all of our constructions.
Spanish cedar wooden shutters not only look wonderful, but also add definite value to a property. While some companies may use inferior lumber, Estate Millwork’s handpicked Cedar can resist any number of common pests, including both insects and rotting.
In an industry that can be known for issues such as deforestation, we are an environmentally conscious company, using only hardwoods that come from sustainable forests. Our high-tech processes and technologies allow us to get a maximum use out of every piece of lumber used to create an exterior shutter.
If you have any questions regarding our exterior shutters, please e-mail us or call us at 412.641.0177
– our friendly, knowledgeable representatives will be glad to help you.
For further wood shutter info, send us an email or give us a call today.
Solid Wood Mortise and Tenons
True Tenons
Our premium quality shutters are carefully constructed using a time consuming and precise operation. Whereas other lower quality shutters are made using screws, nails, dowels or biscuit joints, each of our exterior wooden shutters has a minimum of 4 hardwood tenons. The end of each rail is painstakingly machined to have a 1/2" X 1 7/8" tenon by a custom built tenoning machine that Estate Millwork developed so that we could continue to provide the best quality joinery in the industry, at an attractive price. We gave up the cost, but not the quality.
Deep Pocket Mortises
Each stile is precision machined with a minimum of two deep pocket mortises, and these mortises perfectly fit the associated tenon. Again, Estate Millwork has used precision automation to preserve the quality of our products, while reducing the cost. We have software that connects our website directly to the machines in the plant, and when a customer places an order with us, all of the precision programs for machining the mortises into the stiles are sent to the plant for automatic execution. The mortise tenon joint, is the strongest joint in millwork, and adds tremendous strength, even without the use of glue.
Hardwood Dowels
Once the tenon and mortise have been machined, the parts are put together and a hole is drilled through the mortise and the tenon. A slightly oversized hardwood dowel is driven into the hole, locking the tenon into the mortise for the life of the shutter. Even though glue is not required, Estate Millwork takes the added step of gluing the tenon into the mortise, and gluing the hardwood dowel into the stile.
Hand Assembly
In our commitment to preserving the best of quality millwork traditions in each wood shutter, we have automated much of the drudgery of some of the operations, but assembling a shutter is still something very much in the realm of craftsmanship. After all the parts of each wooden shutter are manufactured, one of our skilled craftsmen fits them together in a specialized jig for dry fitting and final assembly. We do not use pneumatic or hydraulic clamps as they can damage or over-stress the wood. The craftsman uses his innate feel for the materials to set the appropriate clamping pressure prior to drilling and doweling. Each wooden shutter receives the individual attention of craftsmen all along the way, but the final assembly is where the shutter comes together the first time, ready for years of service on your home.
Precision Crafted Louvered Shutters Using State of the Art CNC Machinery
Solid Louvers
Each louver in our louvered shutters is precision machined in a 5 head moulder that can be configured to mould any of our 3 standard production profiles, or custom profiles as specified by the customer. We offer 1/2" X 2 1/4", 3/8" X 1 3/4", and 1/4" X 1 1/4" bullnose profiles, but also have tooling for chevron, beveled, and other louver profiles. Whether the louvered shutter is to use fixed louver or operable louvers, we can even create custom tooling to match existing millwork, or to provide the ultimate in personalization and detailing.
True Louvered Shutter Mortises and Louver Mortises
Each louver in a fixed louvered shutter is seated in a 7/16" deep mortise in the shutter stile. Our CNC machining equipment be instantly programmed to program any variation of louver size, profile, pitch, and spacing, that gives us unlimited flexibility to match historic millwork, or to create custom louvered shutters to a precise specification in terms of louver count, rail placement, and air flow. In the same pass as the louver mortises are being created, our equipment also creates the larger mortises for each rail in the shutter. Unlike many custom shutter manufacturers today, Estate Millwork does not use cheap dowels, veneers, screws, or biscuits. Instead we use old fashioned mortise and tenon joints, even though they are considered by other custom shutter manufacturers as too expensive. Because we have invested heavily in automation, our cost to produce highly custom louvered shutters using solid materials and premium joinery is much lower than other manufacturers, hence: higher quality, lower price.
Solid Tenons
The tenons on both ends of each rail are engineered to give maximum stability to the louvered shutter frame, and when combined with our hardwood dowling, the shutter frame will stay together and be extremely stable, even without glue. But of course we use glue for added strength. For larger louvered shutters, we use a 10 inch baserail that has two tenons and a third feather tenon for additional strength that connects the two main tenons. These tenons are precision machined on a propriety tenon machine that Estate Millwork designed and custom built. Our sophisticated mortise and tenon joinery preserves 100% of the quality of traditional mortise and tenon joinery at a fraction of the cost.
Shutter Options
Thickness, Width, Height
The "slab dimensions" are the size of the actual exterior shutter from top to bottom, left to right, and the thickness. Our default standard thickness is 1 5/16", but that can be varied from 7/8" to 2 1/4" to match existing exterior shutters. The length and height can be specified to the nearest 1/16" inch. Depending upon the style of the shutter, we have made widths up to 20 feet wide, and heights up 30 feet.
Shutter Frame Dimensions
Because all of our exterior wooden shutters are custom built from true rail and stile construction, we have the ability to replicate any component dimension on existing shutters, including rail height, placement, width, thickness, and stile width and thickness. Typically, the bottom rail of our custom shutters is 4. high, and all other rails are 2 1/2" inches. Stile widths are usually 2 1/2" but we have the ability to make them of virtually any width, including different widths for left and right stiles -- sometimes used for pairs of shutters.
Custom Sticking
Out standard products are S4S, or square shoulder sticking, but we have the capability to mould any feasible profile to the inner or outer frame fields. Common choices are ogee, cove and bead, bevel, cove etc. In addition to our stock sticking profiles, we can also custom grind tooling to achieve any desired profile to either match historical wood shutters, or to meet an architects or home owner.s specifications and preferences.
Shiplapping and Beading
For operable shutters, or for decoration, our wood shutters can be machined with a bead on one face of the inside edge of the shutter, and with a ship lap on the other, allowing the shutters to overlap by 3/8" when they are in the closed position - permitting a tighter fit. The left and right shutters are machined as pairs so that in the closed position, each face of the pair has a decorative bead visible.
Panel Profiles
Our raised panel shutters can be raised with our standard scoop profile, but we offer bevels, coves, ogeees and other profiles as well. Additionally, for the extremely discriminating home owner or architect we can create new tooling to match existing historical panel profiles, or to meet with a unique custom requirement.
Louver Styles
Our louvered shutters can be fitted with either our standard bullnose louvers in 3 sizes, or with a chevron or bevel profile as options. And because we are a custom shutter maker, we can also accommodate any special profiles that are specified by the customer.
Cut Outs
Raised Panel and Flat Panel Shutters can have a limitless variety of decorative cut outs machined into the center of the panels. Common shapes are moons, anchors, trees, hearts and we have a large number of stock cut outs which we offer, as well as the ability to match custom patterns that are provided by the customer
Finishes
Estate Millwork can ship our custom wooden shutters in natural, primed, painted or stained finishes. We can match national brand color numbers, pre-tint primers for light or dark finishes, and apply hand rubbed stain finished, even to the time consuming louvered shutters.
Poplar the Poor Man's Cherry
Poplar hardwood lacking bold coloration or an exciting grain pattern has a pale olive-yellow brown heartwood and sapwood is lighter off-white or gray with greenish hues and doesn't often get the respect we feel it deserves. The Poplar tree is widespread across all of North America and Europe, and it grows very rapidly and to large sizes, making it very easy to sustain.
Because the wood is often painted or used in secondary applications where it isn’t visible, it is very easy to find wide, clear sections of Poplar for a variety of uses.
Poplar lumber is pretty soft and very easy to work. But botanically speaking it is a hardwood meaning it is a deciduous tree. But it is highly stable, easily available in width and length, and takes paint and stain famously well. However using Poplar as a stain grade species is often overlooked. Some will call Poplar wood "poor man's Cherry" as it oxidizes over time to a much darker shade of brown.
Handcrafted with Sustainably Harvested Lumber
At Estate Millwork we air dry much of our lumber, and after air drying we finish drying in low wattage dehumidification kilns.
Every piece of wood we purchase is used to the fullest on products, at Estate Millwork we have a very high yield ratio of 94 percent due to the use of automated saws and optimizing software. The remainimg 6 percent which is mostly sawdust and chips are either burned to heat our plant or send to local cattle farmers for bedding and composting.
Nothing is wasted. Some of Appalachian lumber we use comes from Amish farmers in our county who harvest with horses instead of mechanized equipment, and do our rough sawing on 1920s sawmills that are also extremely low input compared to larger commercial sawmills of today. All of our imported lumber is plantation grown, and not harvested from natural forests.
To learn more about our sustainability practices click here
