Bringing The Outside In: Which Doors Are Right For You?

Creating a natural flow between indoor and outdoor living areas is hugely popular in contemporary architecture and home design.

Opening up solid wall space within your home with large expanses of glass not only makes a great style impact but also allows natural daylight to pour in and means you can make the most of your outside views. If you want the flexibility to seamlessly merge inside and outside living spaces, then you may want to choose to install statement glazed doors. Whether you opt for stylish French doors, a stunning bi-fold, or a sleek lift and slide will probably depend on a number of factors.

Style & Design

Bringing the outside in allows you to enjoy the beautiful scenery in the immediate surroundings of your home and floods living areas with natural daylight. This concept applies to both closed and opened doors. With this in mind, minimal sight lines and large glazed areas are key to achieving the desired effects.

While French, bi-fold and lift and slide doors will all improve your indoor / outdoor connection, the sliding doors quite simply have the higher glass to frame ratio and so come out on top in this respect.

One of the greatest advantages of installing a bi-fold door is the fact that, when it is fully open, the wall between your living space and garden becomes almost entirely clear.

French doors that fold back on themselves completely also have the ability to create this opening - but on a smaller scale. The open space created by a lift and slide door is approximately 65-70% of its total size. When comparing like for like in this context, bi-fold doors provide a real wow factor and allow for fluid indoor / outdoor living.

Bi-fold doors require slightly more space when they are open, as they fold back against themselves concertina-style. Again, these can be fabricated to open inwards or outwards, which provides a degree of flexibility as to where the leaves stack. Our lift and slide doors on the other hand do not project either in or out: they slide sideways to the end of the frame, so the sashes take up relatively less space than the other two options when the door is open.

If you are working with a smaller room and opening, then our composite French doors are a great option. They can open inwards or outwards and, if specified, have the ability to fold back 180 degrees.

FUNCTIONALITY

While some often consider these statement doors to be for occasional use, all of our doors are carefully designed with everyday operation in mind. Using robust hardware, which is tried and trusted, our doors are built to be enjoyed for many years to come. In terms of functionality, all of these doors provide you with the option to create a clear open space between the inside and outside of your home.

Want to open the door just enough to let in a gentle breeze? With a turn of the handle, you can lock the doors into your desired position.

But what if you don’t want this day to day? Lift and slide doors allow you greater control over how much open space you want to create at any given time. Opt for a bi-fold with an odd number of panes to allow an access door. Use it easily and conveniently for everyday traffic, and to save folding the doors back completely. Similarly with French doors - simply open just one at a time.

Energy Efficicency & COST

All of our composite French, bi-fold and lift and slide doors have large glazed areas, some significantly larger than others. Does this mean that they aren’t thermally efficient? Not at all - the doors have timber structures, insulated, argon-filled glazing units with warm edge spacer bars and Low-E glass. This potent combination of material choice ensures the energy efficiency of the products. The low u-values of these doors provide another multi-faceted stack of advantages. Your home benefits not only from the extra daylight that they allow into your living areas but also from a reduction in the heat loss that you may currently experience. This, in turn, should lead to lower energy consumption.

The costs of these doors vary depending on size and specification required. Comparing like for like, our bi-folds, which will be a real wow factor in any property, tend to be the most expensive. These are closely followed by our lift and slides, which maximise your ability to bring the outside in all year round. Finally, our French doors tend to be the most economical and are a fantastic addition to any living area.