Transparent Roller Shutter Doors in Cape Town

A transparent roller shutter door locks an opening without hiding what is behind it. Cape Town is the market where this product makes the most sense we see anywhere, because so much of the housing and retail here is built around a view or a display that nobody wants blanked out at night.

How a transparent roller shutter door is built

• Polycarbonate panels linked by aluminium slats, so the curtain rolls like any other.
• Full-height glazed curtains where the whole opening should stay visible.
• Mixed curtains with a solid or perforated lower section under a glazed upper.
• Stainless and marine-grade hardware where the position calls for it.

Glazed shutters on homes with a view

A house on the Atlantic seaboard, in Hout Bay, above Muizenberg or looking at Table Bay from Blouberg was bought for what it looks at. A glazed curtain secures the main opening and leaves the view. It costs more than a solid shutter and on those properties it is very often the only answer the owner will accept.

Transparent shutters for retail

At the V and A Waterfront, Canal Walk, Cavendish and along the City Bowl and Sea Point trading streets, a glazed shutter means the display keeps working after closing. The shop is locked, the window is not.

Aluminium slats and salt

The slats between the panels are the part that corrodes, not the polycarbonate. On a coastal installation we specify anodised or marine-grade coated aluminium slats and stainless fixings, because a glazed curtain with pitted slats looks worse than a plain steel door.

Security of a glazed curtain

Polycarbonate is not glass. It flexes rather than shatters and resists impact well, but on a street frontage or a ground-floor patio we specify a solid or perforated lower section under a glazed upper so the reachable part of the door is steel. That gives visibility above and security below.

Salt film, cleaning and clouding

This is the honest limitation on this coast. Salt spray dries on polycarbonate and the mineral film left behind dulls it, and cleaning it off with the wrong cloth scratches the surface. On a seafront property a glazed shutter needs regular, correct cleaning to stay worth what it cost, and we say that clearly at handover rather than after the first summer.

Where a transparent shutter is the wrong choice

Industrial yards, doors that take impact, wash-down environments and the most exposed seafront positions where the cleaning burden is simply unrealistic. We will recommend a perforated curtain instead in those cases, even though it is the cheaper sale.

Motorisation on transparent shutters

These curtains are light, so tube motors handle them comfortably. Safety edges are fitted as standard because these doors are nearly always on openings people walk through.

What a transparent roller shutter door costs in Cape Town

Priced on opening size, the proportion of glazed to solid curtain, the hardware grade and the drive. We survey on site and quote firm.