August 1, 2018

Pros and Cons of Frameless Shower Doors

Clearly Beautiful

Frameless shower doors are somewhat of a buzzword in the home improvement industry. Far advanced beyond the meager, mildew attracting shower curtain, this popular bathroom upgrade is an investment in the beauty and  function of your bathroom. The advantages of frameless shower doors are best represented in pictures, as the look is the most appealing part of these sleek shower enclosures. Modern, clean, simple, all these current superlatives are present in a well designed and properly installed frameless shower door. The unobstructed view of the frameless tempered glass opens up the room visually, expanding the room and creating an atmosphere of spa like luxury. Functionally, they easy and trouble free. Frameless shower doors are super easy to clean, requiring only glass cleaner and a squeegee, with no mold catching crevices or tracks to complicate the process. Mold problems, ever an issue in wet bathroom environments, are minimized and often eliminated.

Is Beautiful Best?

There are some down sides to frameless glass shower doors. The biggest being cost: off the shelf or custom made, these doors are much more expensive than framed glass doors, from as little as twice as much up to ten times the cost. Add to that professional installation; this is not a DIY job, as one small mistake can break and ruin the entire door, and poor installation can lead to disaster. There is also the small percentage of tempered glass door explosions. All tempered glass shower doors, framed or unframed, have a rather mysterious, extremely rare, risk of sudden and spontaneous breakage due to internal flaws in the glass, improper installation or other unknown factors. With a frameless door, it is important to make sure shower heads are positioned to spray away from the shower door, to prevent water escaping through the gaps, tiny as they may be. If you are considering a frameless glass shower door, it is a good idea to get the installer involved in the bathroom design planning process as early as possible.