A glass block is a brick of glass that is used to build a glass wall that is used in public buildings in order to obscure the ability to see the room on the other side of the wall, while allowing natural sunlight into the room (kind of like stained glass windows, except colorless). The use of block glass is most commonly used as a separating wall between public restrooms for men and women. A glass block wall offers a look of elegance and privacy single pane glass doesn’t. Glass blocks have also been used to create a half wall in studio apartments or lofts in order create space between two rooms.
The glass block is also commonly used when remodeling bathrooms in homes, especially for bathroom windows. A glass block window in a bathroom will allow natural sunlight come in to the room while making is impossible for anyone to look into the window and see anyone while in the room. There are many advantages to the use of glass block windows. For instance the main advantage is increased privacy. Additional measures to ensure privacy in the home is if the home is built in a area where the homes are very close together and it is easy to see in the windows of others.
Another benefit to a glass block installation is that it will help decrease the cost of the heating and cooling bills. Standard bathroom windows are normally a single pane of glass that is installed in an aluminum frame, they are not known for their energy efficiency. A block glass window is ten times more energy efficient than the single pane glass. Another great addition to a remodeled bathroom is the glass block shower. There are many who are installing curved glass block showers because they have a sleek look and eliminate the need for a shower door and best of all they are easy to clean. One thing to keep in mind is they can be very expensive because if is difficult to design the curvature of the base of the shower to work with the block bricks because the contractor is unable to cut the bricks to fit.
The type of glass wall desired will determine the glass block prices paid for the project. In order to keep costs down it is important to properly and thoroughly design the project and to stick to the plan design. Keeping the design of the wall or window as simple as possible is the key to keeping the cost of the use of glass blocks for a window or wall at a minimum.
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