As scheduled, workers from our invisible grill contractor – Legate – came by to start installing grills at just about every open spot in our Minton home. From the get go, we knew we’ll need grills. Not just for the balconies but more importantly for our bedrooms, since the presence of bay windows make it too easy for young children like ours to climb up them and pose dangers to themselves if they leaned too far out of the windows.
Homeowners living here in high-density apartment blocks might already be familiar with such grills, and how they’re quite different from the traditional aluminum or ironcast grills. The latter are the strongest types, but can also be pretty expensive, while aluminum grills – what we’re having already in our current place – is a nice compromise between strength and cost. They do have the odd characteristic of making one’s home look like a jail cell LOL. Then there are also color schemes and grill designs that are instituted by the condo’s managing agent to maintain a consistent facade.
The fashionable thing to do these days is invisible grills, which basically are thin coated steel wires that are tightened and secured within a steel window frame. That it’s called ‘invisible’ is a misrepresentation though – they most certainly are not ‘invisible’ – but they still look neater than the aluminum grills we’re used to. While they do act as a good-enough barrier against kids accidentally falling out of windows, they are not especially strong with determined efforts involving knives and scissors of course, and certainly not against determined intruders wanting to break into the house.
It wasn’t quite an easy choice deciding which invisible grill vendor to go to. We got quotations from several, but eventually settled for what seems to be the local industry’s most prominent if not largest provider of these grills for residential homes. The installation will take 2 days, and cost just a shade under $4,000 to grill up entire apartment, including for both balconies, and also a special casement window grill to provide access to the air-con ledge at the yard balcony.
Pictures and comments towards the end of the first day of installation.
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