Sector 137 and the towers around it are high-rise living on the Expressway - Paras Tierea, Logix Blossom and their neighbours. These are recent buildings with proper service lifts, which changes the work in one specific and welcome way: we are rarely forced to split a panel. Most runs here can be a single piece.
A lift that takes the panel changes the design
In most older buildings we design around what the stair or a small lift will allow, and full-height runs need a joint. Here, usually not.
The service lifts in these towers were built for handover fit-outs, and most take a panel comfortably. That means a shower enclosure or a balcony run can be a single piece of glass, which is both better looking and one less thing to seal.
We still measure the lift car, the lift door and the lobby turn before designing anything, because towers differ and a booking slot is not a size. But on this stretch the answer is usually yes, and we can design for appearance rather than for what will fit.
New flats, so frameless is a real option
Frameless glass is cut square and needs walls that are close to true. In a fifteen-year-old flat they usually are not, and a slim frame becomes the sensible answer whether you wanted it or not.
In a recently handed-over tower the walls generally are true, and the tiles are new. So here the choice between frameless and framed is genuinely about how you want it to look and what you want to clean, rather than about what the building will tolerate.
We still check with a level while measuring - handover quality varies and we would rather find a leaning wall now than after the glass is made. But in this sector the answer is usually that either will sit well.
Doing everything on one visit
In a flat that is being fitted out, the bathroom and the balcony are naturally one job, and separating them is the most common way people spend more than they need to.
The costs that do not shrink are the measuring visit, the delivery, the lift booking and a day of the team's time. Those are paid once whether we fit one enclosure or an enclosure plus a balcony plus a second bathroom.
So we ask what else the flat needs while we are measuring, even where you were only thinking about the shower. It is also one lift booking and one gate registration instead of three, which the society prefers as much as you will.
