Universities are always expanding. With more funding and with more research, putting in a new building is often a necessity. Plus, because so many universities are becoming aged, having  been built decades ago, they also must be updated. While there are many parts of a university building that may need improvement, today, we want to talk about how university building design can be improved with skylights.

Eco Friendly

The first thing to note is that including skylights in a university building’s design is an eco-friendly improvement. Instead of relying on large, overhead lights to brighten a main room, skylights will take advantage of the natural light outdoors. This is incredibly beneficial because the amount of money it costs to electrically light large, university classrooms or entry rooms can add up very quickly.

Not only do skylights save universities money by allowing them to spend less on electricity, less electricity use is better for the environment. The less energy we use overall, the less we rely on energy production, which is important until we, as a country, are using entirely renewable energy.

Morale Boost

If you’ve ever walked into a large building with a central room that has electrical lighting, you know it can be pretty depressing. Buildings with multistory foyers or common areas surrounded by floor lofts are wonderful. They’re spacious, tall, and offer a sense of breathing room. However, those effects can be entirely ruined if the only lighting is coming from ceiling lights. The lack of natural light and inadequate windows can quickly turn something spacious into something cavernous.

With large skylights overhead, however, it gives us a sense that there is no ceiling. The building’s space just goes on and on. Plus, everything can be its truest color under the crystal clear light provided by the outdoors. Sunlight coming in from overhead will reveal crisply and cleanly, signage, artwork, and other people. Electric lights just can’t compete.

Beautiful Appearance

Skylights are gorgeous. This is especially true of large, expansive skylights that are so sought after for university building design. They are so attractive, in fact, that most universities are implementing them in buildings with large, central rooms. The boost in appearance that skylights lend to university buildings is not just a huge morale boost. Additionally, they improve the value of the building. While university buildings are not likely to get sold or need additional appeal for profit margins, their value does increase the overall property value of the university.

Improve University Building Design with Aluplex

Aluplex is Toronto’s #1 skylight manufacturer and installer. If you want skylights for your university building design, give us a call today. We don’t just produce skylights, we also install them and provide 24 hour, emergency maintenance. Plus, we make other windows too. If you’re constructing a new university building, we can provide all the windows you need – not just skylights. For the highest quality windows around, Aluplex is the clear choice.

Want your office to stand out against the rest? Looking to make your office look high class? Office skylights are exactly what you need. The line between a hole-in-the-wall office and a noteworthy one can be something as simple as appearance. One of the easiest ways to make your office look expensive and high class without spending a fortune is by adding office skylights. Here’s how you can use and place skylights to your advantage.

The Perks of Skylights

Skylights have a lot of benefits that helps them pay for themselves. For one thing, they raise the property value of whatever building you put them in. They look prestigious without an outrageous pricetag. This makes your building’s resale value much better than a building without.

Secondly, you can save money on lights when you have skylights installed. If your skylights are placed in a central location and provide enough sunlight to your office, you may not even need electric lights on during office hours. That can save you a lot of money and is also better for the environment. 

Where to Put Them

The thing about skylights is that you need to put them in the right place. If you choose a bad place for your skylights, they might just prove to be a waste of money. Here are some great places to consider instead.

Over the Work Space

The best place you can put your skylights is over the main office work space. This provides employees light to work by and allows you to minimize electricity use during work hours. Plus, the aesthetic appeal of skylights overhead is sure to provide a morale boost for employees. Being cooped up in an office the entire morning can be a real downer. Letting in the sun and giving employees a view of the sky can help counteract that.

Above the Lobby

If you have a large lobby where clients, customers, or patients spend much of their visit, this is a great place for a skylight. Making your lobby feel bright and open is a great way to make your visitors want to come back. Having a classy waiting room or other type of lobby will leave a lasting impression on those who stop by. When your office is the first one they think of in the future, they’re sure to return.

However, if you’re considering installing skylights above your lobby, you should first decide if this is the best place for them. If you only have enough in the budget for one set of skylights, prioritizing the main work space is more likely to pay off. If you’re looking to install in two places, the main work space and the lobby make a great pair.

If you’re building or renovating an office in Toronto, Aluplex is your #1 source for glass. Give us a call if you have any questions about our products and we’ll be more than happy to answer them. We can also help you with your order of any of our glass products, including skylights. 

If you have a skylight that’s begun to leak, you have quite the problem on your hands. Even a skylight that drips can be a nightmare. Whether your skylight is in a home or business, this dripping can lead to a lot of damage. That’s why you need to fix skylight leaks fast. Aluplex is the leading skylight manufacturer and repair service in Toronto. If you have a skylight leak, you can rely on us 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

Avoid Shop Damage

If you own a store and you’ve got a skylight that’s started to leak, there’s a lot for you to lose. Water leaking in from above can have be detrimental for a store. If merchandise gets wet, it can mold or warp irreparably, costing you hundreds or thousands of dollars.

If your skylight is leaking, it needs to be repaired. Aluplex has 24/7 emergency repair services because we know that skylight repairs need to happen as soon as possible. Even a few hours can cause a lot of damage. Let us keep you in business by getting your store skylight repaired fast.

Avoid Home Damage

A skylight leaking in your home can be even worse than a commercial leak. For one thing, you’re more likely to have carpet. Wet carpet is bad news, especially if the water dripping onto it is bringing bacteria with it from the outdoors. If there’s mold in the crevices of your skylight, water leaking through it can bring in mold and allow it to soak into your carpet and grow. Replacing carpet can be incredibly expensive.

Furniture is a whole other problem. If your skylight begins leaking in the evening, have us come out right away. If you wait until the next morning, the leak could get worse while you sleep. Moldy water soaking into your couch cushions or pooling on your hardwood floors can lead to expensive repairs. While a shop may be covered by insurance, it’s unlikely that the average homeowner has insurance on their furniture. Buying a new couch due to water damage or mold is no one’s idea of a good time.

Damage Control

If your skylight starts to leak, you’ll need to act promptly, but it doesn’t have to be a disaster. If you take the right steps, things will turn out just fine. Here’s what you need to do to ensure your home or business stays safe in the case of a skylight leak.

• As soon as you notice the leak, you should make sure the floor is cleared beneath it. If it’s over a flat surface, like a table, that’s fine too.
• Find a bucket to place beneath the leak. If you don’t have a bucket on-hand, you can also use a mixing bowl, regular bowl, or even a cup. Just remember, the smaller the vessel, the more frequently you’ll need to check if it needs to be emptied.
• Call us at Aluplex right away. Our all-day emergency repair team will come as soon as possible and get your skylight leaks taken care of. Our services are available even during storms, so don’t hesitate to call.

If you know the incredible benefits of having a skylight, you might be trying to determine the best places to put them. Aluplex is the leading skylight manufacturer in Toronto and we have some advice for you. Want to buy and install pyramid skylights? Here are the best places you can put them.

At Home

Closed Porch

If you’re looking to put pyramid skylights in your home, one of the best places, hands down, is the closed porch. An enclosed porch is a magnet for windows. Most of them usually have large windows along the walls. However, even better is implementing skylights in addition. What better way to improve your sunroom than allowing it to take in sun during all hours of the day.

If you use your sunroom as a greenhouse, this is especially good for plants. A skylight allows more of your plants to get the light they need during more hours of the day. Well-sunned plants are happy plants.

Master Bedroom

Another great place to install pyramid skylights is in the master bedroom. A small collection of pyramid skylights in the middle of the master bedroom ceiling is divine. Light coming in from above will cast beautiful sunshine on your bed in the morning. What better way to wake than to the morning sun?

Master Bathroom

Waking to the sun not for you? Pyramid skylights in the master bathroom are the next best thing. Taking a bath is a fantastic way to relax, but bathing in the dark can be drab. Most bathrooms either don’t have windows, or implement blinds for privacy. Unless you have a secluded estate where no one can see in your bathroom windows, we assume you do too. That can make bathing kind of a dark affair.

That’s where skylights come in. Having skylights in the bathroom can make bathtime both relaxing and uplifting. Get your daily dose of vitamin D while enjoying a dip in the tub – and don’t worry about your neighbors catching a glimpse. 

At Work

The Lobby

Pyramid skylights are great for in lobbies. Whether you own a hotel or a restaurant, the entryway is one place you don’t want to be dark. When people step inside, you want them to be able to see the interior clearly. Plus, you want the building to feel spacious.

Skylights create a more spacious feeling in any building and give some much-needed light in commercial buildings. Plus, they help you save money on electricity because the sun works for free.

The Dining Room

Hotel, cafeteria, or dining hall at a retirement home, if you have a dining room, it can benefit from skylights. Because dining rooms are wide open spaces and can only have windows on the outer walls, oftentimes the middle of the room feels dark or drab. That can be caused by lack of lighting or from dim, yellow lights. Bring your dining room to life with some pyramid skylights. They’ll let in plenty of sunlight and make dining a much more enjoyable experience.

If you’re interested in pyramid skylights, give us a call at Aluplex. We look forward to serving anyone in the GTA and we’re sure you’ll love the results.

Skylights are beautiful additions to any home, but deciding whether you want one installed can be a difficult decision. One thing that always makes the deciding process a little easier is hearing more about the possibilities. That’s why Aluplex is here to talk about the 3 best rooms for installing a skylight. Maybe with a little fodder for the imagination, you’ll settle on buying a skylight after all!

The Kitchen

The first room that is great for installing a skylight in is the kitchen. Because the kitchen is a workplace, having a skylight overhead is great for a number of reasons. The first perk is that you get extra light on your counters. Being able to see what you’re doing when cooking is incredibly convenient. Not to mention, sunlight is so much brighter and easier to see by than electric lighting. If you plan on installing a skylight in your kitchen, prepare for everything to become brighter and more alive.

The Hallway

One place that does well with skylights but often isn’t considered is the hallway. If you have a main hallway in your home, consider how much nicer it would be with sunlight streaming into it.

Hallways tend to be fairly dim because they aren’t typically exposed to windows. While they may have a light in them, the yellow of a lightbulb doesn’t do much to open the space up. Crystal clear sunlight streaming into your hallway from above will make the space feel bigger, nicer, and more open. Plus, putting a skylight over the hall is less likely to lead to sunlight getting in the way than if you put it in, say, the living room.

The living room tends to be the first place people think of when determining rooms to put skylights in. However, the living room is usually home to the TV or collects people who want to use their laptops on the couch. Screens and skylights are a bad combination unless you’re willing to invest in motorized skylight blinds.

The Bathroom

If you haven’t experienced a bathroom with a skylight in it, you’re missing out. Putting a skylight in the bathroom is an underrated design choice. Because bathrooms usually have either no windows or a window that stays covered most of the time, they don’t usually get the sunlight they deserve.

By installing a skylight in the bathroom, you allow your bathroom to be bright and illuminated all throughout the day. Imagine the serene experience of taking a bath in the early afternoon while the midday sun streams in from above. It’s truly worth considering.

Installing a Skylight

If you’re interested in installing a skylight in the Toronto area, Aluplex is the #1 company for the job. We’re the leading glass production company in the area and our specialty in skylights makes us the most qualified for your installation needs. Give us a call if you have any questions and we’ll be more than happy to help.

There are a lot of design features that are simply there for the appearance. Many people would assume skylight windows fall into this category, but it’s not so. Skylight windows actually have a lot of benefits that make them worth installing. It’s especially worth it if you’re considering installing skylights in offices. Here’s why they’re a good addition to any office building.

Skylights in Offices Save Money

The most obvious benefit to having skylights is that they can save you money on electricity. Because the sun is usually out during business hours, most offices can cut down their electricity use from electric lighting by over 75%. This is especially true if you have large windows on the walls as well. In combination, your office will be completely lit up throughout working hours.

Quality of Life

Skylights do more than just produce light. They also improve quality of life. Not only can it improve moods to have something nice to look at, it also exposes employees to the sun. As we know, the sun is a rich source of vitamin D. Did you know vitamin D deficiency is one of the leading causes of depression in the US and Canada? People staying indoors most of the time leads to lower vitamin D which causes depression and pain among other things.

Therefore, putting skylights into your office building and allowing the sun to shine into your employee’s workspace is sure to improve their moods and make them feel better about their environment.

Employee Productivity

An office with skylight windows is bound to have increased employee productivity. This is for a number of reasons. For one, the aforementioned lighting boost allows less strain on the eyes and an easier time getting things done. The quality of life improvement is also likely to improve productivity. Happier people have an easier time getting to work.

Not only does they improve overall productivity, skylights will also improve work quality. That better mood is sure to make employee work more inspired. People do tend to put more effort into their work when they feel it’s meaningful. That’s hard to do if you’re in a depressing work environment.

Office Resale Boost

Last, but not least, having skylights in your office provides a significant resale boost. Because of the mentioned perks of having skylights, offices with skylights are coveted pieces of real estate. If you plan on moving your business to a different location or selling sometime in the distant future, know that skylights will help.

People walk into an office with skylights and immediately get a positive feeling about the place. With so many dark, dismal office spaces, the feeling of walking into a bright, sunshine-filled space is a memorable one.

If you have any questions about skylights, how they’re installed, or how to get one, give us a call at Aluplex. We look forward to hearing from you.