Fenestration Guy

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Fenestration Guy

Everything you need to know about windows. My hope is to educate builders, architects and DIY’ers

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02/27/2024

Here is a beautiful wood door with sidelites and transoms that have mullions that carry up through the transom. The panels at the bottom are shaker style and the grids on the glass are “simulated divided lite” which give it the appearance of separate glass panes, but in reality it’s one piece of glass. I would say this door turned out beautiful. I forgot to take a before picture but it had glass block around the entire door and was very outdated.
Also, PSA: wood doors normally can’t be painted or stained by the factory unless you’re purchasing through a custom shop. This means it needs to be finished on site or taken to a finishing shop prior to installation. Just a little detail to be aware of when shopping for new doors.

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02/22/2024

I have posted a lot about shadow boxes and many of you wonder what the technical connection detail looks like. Well, here you have it thanks to - this method seems to make a lot of sense to me. By utilizing a fl**ge, installers can flash it just like a window fl**ge and create a water tight opening. Notice the small details, such as the slight slope on both the head & sill of the shadow box? What are you me thoughts?

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02/19/2024

This is a nice detail on a commercial structure where the architect spec’d drainage at each window opening. The builder connected the rough opening of each window to this drainage hole to allow water to escape. Well thought out and well executed. I don’t know the exact architectural details (so don’t ask 😂) but we can still admire the ex*****on.

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02/11/2024

Energy transfer through windows is more complicated than you think. It includes heat transfer via conduction, convection and radiation. Now next time you look at a window, you can tell your friends all about the science behind how they are losing heat through their windows 😉

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02/04/2024

Clean lines + contrasting colors + full surround Heka hood = stunning facade.

Architect = Lume Architecture
Builder = Lume Projects
Photography =
Metal hood/surround =

02/01/2024

Modern doors come in many forms. This is a wood/aluminum clad door with 3” stile and rails with multi-point hardware by
We also installed some on the exterior of these doors.

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01/30/2024

This condo building is four stories tall facing bellingham bay and I’ve been called out twice in the past two weeks for window leakage issues. The problem doesn’t have to do with flashing, as you can see the head flashing was executed well. The issue stems from the product selected for the environment and exposure. These are vinyl sliding windows which probably have a design pressure rating of around 20. Which means if there is wind that is 35mph blowing on that window during a rain storm, water will pe*****te through the meeting rail/weatherstripping and onto the inside track. Yes, it does weep back outside through internal channels - but ultimately water shouldn’t be able to get to the inside of windows. The product should have been more robust for this exposure. Architects, make sure you are selecting windows that can withstand the environmental loads it will experience.

01/25/2024

Somebody really botched this replacement window job…. This window is about 2” too small both width and height. I thought I’ve seen it all until now.

01/23/2024

Alloy shrouds provide a very unique design element to a building facade. Beyond looks, they are also practical by helping deflect bulk water off of the window as well as sun shading. Detailing these correctly can be tricky but these were executed soundly by - details include:
- 5 degree slope on top shroud
- shrouds attached to vented cavity battens, rather than the water/air layer (this reduces thermal bridging)
- z head flashing taped to wrb and laps onto the shroud

All work by

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01/14/2024

This is a detail for retrofitting windows into existing homes when the siding is left in place. The biggest differentiator here is the sill flashing detail. The liquid flash or self-adhered membrane shingle laps over the turned up metal leg. Down turn leg of rigid flashing exists below exterior bottom trim which allows water to drain to the exterior of the envelope. Older homes will never have a rainscreen/drainage plane and may not even have an adequate WRB - which is why allowing the water to drain to the outside at each window sill is key.
I want to know if anyone has incorporated this detail before. If not, what do you think of it? Worth a try?
Architectural drawing from Building Science Corporation.

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01/12/2024

Last night I had the pleasure of joining fellow building nerds to walk through panelized house build here in Bellingham. It was inspiring to see so many passionate people about high performance building all in in place.

If you don’t know what panelized building is, it’s where the walls and roof are fully constructed offsite in a controlled environment. The panels are brought on site and hoisted into place. This house went from bare cement slab to all walls and roof built in 3.5 days (and that was in very windy, rainy and cold weather). To complete the building envelope, all that’s left to install are windows, roof, and cladding/trim details.

Since these panels are built off site the margin of error is minimal so proper preparation is paramount. From the architect ( ) to the local builder ( ) to the cement pouring sub. Everything must be executed with near perfection, and this one was successful!

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01/09/2024

This is a commercial storefront window system and over the operable window portion, there is a built-in flashing detail to direct bulk water over the seam of that operable sash. To be honest, I haven’t seen this before on a commercial style system - but needless to say, I was quite pleased to see this design incorporated.

For those local followers, these windows are on parkview elementary school.
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Bellingham, WA
98225-98229

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