Restoration West
2025 Window Restoration Industry Expert
Founding Year: 2022
Key Team Member: Caitlyn Barhorst
Original historic windows are a defining feature of a building’s architecture and essential to maintaining its integrity. Despite their importance, Utah has few experts specializing in historic window restoration. Homeowners who wish to preserve their original windows often face significant challenges, including a shortage of skilled professionals, high costs, and long wait times. As a result, many people find it difficult to restore their historic windows without taking on the project themselves.
Since its founding in 2022, Restoration West has revolutionized the accessibility of historic window restoration in Utah. What began as a one-person operation led by Caitlyn Barhorst quickly grew to a team of seven in just three years, demonstrating the community’s demand for this specialized service. By filling a critical gap in preservation expertise, Restoration West has empowered more property owners to retain and restore their historic windows, helping preserve these valuable architectural features for years.
Restoration West approaches each project with specialized knowledge, ensuring the highest standards of craftsmanship in every historic window restoration. The team combines traditional techniques, tools, and materials with modern innovations to preserve and enhance original wood sash windows. In addition to meticulously repairing window sashes and sills and replacing damaged panes and deteriorated wood, their skilled team restores rope-and-weight mechanisms, installs custom-made exterior storm windows, and adds weather stripping to improve comfort and energy efficiency.
What started as a small side venture driven by Caitlyn’s passion for craftsmanship quickly revealed an overwhelming demand for skilled window restoration. Like many entrepreneurs, Caitlyn faced the challenges of transitioning to self-employment, particularly in setting fair prices for such a specialized service. With few window restoration professionals available in Utah, striking a balance between providing equitable preservation and meeting the growing demand has been a continual challenge.
Despite these obstacles, Restoration West remains committed to delivering high-quality work at fair prices, understanding homeowners' financial strain when addressing deferred maintenance. As the company has expanded to meet the increasing demand, operational costs have risen, requiring more staff, workspace, and resources. Yet Caitlyn’s dedication to the mission of preservation remains steadfast. They continue to work within clients' budgets, restoring historic windows without compromising quality.
In just three years, Restoration West has made a lasting impact on historic preservation in Utah. Their work has filled a critical void in the preservation community, offering a solution to the shortage of skilled professionals in historic window restoration.
