There are countless warnings about the risks of UV damage to your skin and how to best protect yourself. But UV rays can also damage the interior of your home. The sun’s rays are strong and can have lasting effects on your home interior, including damaging furniture and décor.

Direct sunlight streaming through your windows can negatively affect many of the interior features of your home, including carpets, window treatments, flooring, furniture, photographs, and artwork. Any form of visible light can cause damaging discoloration, fading, drying, and cracking; but the most harmful light comes from the sun’s ultraviolet rays. Ultraviolet rays are present whether or not the sun is shining; even on rainy or cloudy days, UV rays will make their way through your windows.

Ultraviolet radiation, in fact, is the leading contributor in the fading of fabrics, carpets and furnishings. Research has shown that UV rays, specifically, are responsible for approximately 40 percent of the damage to home interiors caused by light. Light is a form of energy, and within each category of light are different wavelengths. It’s in these wavelengths where the amount of energy is found: the shorter the wavelength, the higher the energy content. Ultraviolet rays carry the shortest wavelengths, therefore giving them the most energy and causing them to be the most damaging.

Over time, the sun’s ultraviolet rays can break down finishes and even damage the cellular structure of objects made from organic materials. The high energy emitted from UV rays causes electrons to be displaced from bonds between atoms, with that causing materials to deteriorate and colors to fade. The heat that results from this high energy can also cause materials to expand and contract, resulting in cracking and damaging of material structure.