Sliding door extension in Alderley Edge

A rear extension where the glass had to do the work

The brief

A rear kitchen extension in Alderley Edge where the whole point of the build was the connection to the garden. The opening was wide, and the requirement was maximum glass and minimum frame, with the door running smoothly enough that it actually gets used rather than left shut.

Why sliding rather than bifold

Bifolds stack their leaves to one side, so a proportion of the opening is always frame even when fully open, and the stack has to go somewhere. A slider keeps the glass in plane and gives you far slimmer sightlines when closed, which matters more in a room you look through every day than in one you throw open a few weekends a year. For this opening, a slider was the right call. For a narrower opening we would have said bifold.

The specification

Aluminium, because at this pane size uPVC needs bulky steel reinforcement to carry the weight and you lose the sightline that justified the glass in the first place. The frames are thermally broken, with an insulating barrier through the middle of the profile, so the inside face does not run with condensation the way an untreated aluminium frame does. The finish is powder coated and will not need repainting.

Hardware and security

Large sliding panes live or die on their running gear. Rollers were specified for the actual pane weight rather than to a generic rating, because undersized rollers are the single most common reason a slider stops sliding after a few years. Locking engages at multiple points, and ground floor glazing on a rear elevation is worth specifying as laminated.

On site

Two weeks on site, coordinated around the extension build so the opening was ready when the frames arrived. Because the doors were made at Trafford Park to the surveyed opening, there was no waiting on a supplier and no adjusting a standard size to fit.