A flush sash is usually talked about as a period solution, and that undersells it. It works on a twentieth-century house as readily as a Victorian one, because the thing a flush sash fixes — a sash standing proud of its frame — turned up on new houses for decades.
On a later house the flat face reads as a deliberate choice rather than a nostalgic one, which is a different argument from the one usually made for it.
The gain is different on a big opening
On a Victorian house the openings are small and the argument for a flush window is mostly about the elevation. On a 1980s or 1990s house the openings are large, and a wide pane in a chunky frame is what makes a replacement window look like a replacement window. A flush line with a slim frame puts the emphasis back on the glass, and in aluminium the frame can be slimmer again. Our piece on Origin aluminium windows and doors goes through how those sections are built.
Half-done elevations
Very few of these houses still have a full set of original windows. Most have had a partial replacement at some point, so one elevation is stepped and another is not. That makes phasing a real decision rather than a budget detail: doing the front first fixes the face of the house but leaves two profiles visible from the garden for a year or two, and doing a whole elevation at a time usually looks resolved sooner than doing the worst windows first.
Flush sash we have fitted nearby
At Feeling flush in Woodbridge, a 1990s detached house still had its original dark-stained timber windows; it now has Origin aluminium flush sash windows throughout, the bay included. At Get Smarts near Hadleigh there are aluminium flush sash windows in a cream finish through the bedroom, bathroom and dormers.
Getting out to you
Ipswich is about 25 to 30 minutes from our Colchester showroom along the A12. The thing to look at on site is the window next to the one you are replacing, because on a half-replaced house that neighbour is what the new one will be judged against.
Our flush casement windows page covers the profiles we fit. If you would rather start with an estimate, send us the openings and we will work from those.
