Sliding doors and glass partitions in Batumi: pocket doors, tracks, glass

A sliding door: inside the wall or along it

Sliding doors and glass partitions in Batumi are ordered when a hinged door has no room to swing open: in a narrow corridor, in a studio, between the kitchen and the living room. The first thing we decide is where the door leaf goes. In a pocket door it disappears into the wall, and on a surface-mounted track it runs along the wall.

If there is a bedroom behind the door and you need quiet, compare a sliding door with ordinary interior doors.

A pocket door: what to decide before the wall is finished

At the heart of a pocket door is a steel box with a guide track at the top. It is set into the frame of a partition and boarded with plasterboard on both sides, which is why a pocket door is planned at the rough stage. In an apartment that has already been renovated, a pocket door means taking down a section of wall and redoing the finishes around the opening, so a track is the more common choice there.

If the wall by the opening is built of aerated concrete blocks, as in most new builds in Batumi, we usually take down the section for the cassette and rebuild it on a steel frame, like a plasterboard partition. We don't touch load-bearing walls without a design and a structural engineer, and before work starts we check with an architect and our partner lawyer whether approval is needed, as with any layout change.

The section with the cassette has no cable and no sockets: a screw or a chase would go into the cavity where the leaf runs, so we move the switch to the other side of the opening. We use cassettes from which the leaf and rollers can be taken out through the opening without opening up the wall.

A door on a surface-mounted track

We fix the track above the opening: into concrete with anchors, into aerated concrete with chemical anchors or plugs made for aerated concrete, and into plasterboard only into a fixing pad fitted before the boarding. At the bottom the leaf is held by a floor guide, otherwise it swings and knocks against the wall. If underfloor heating runs under the opening, we don't drill the floor and fit a guide that fixes to the wall at the edge of the opening. A soft-close mechanism slows the leaf at the end of its travel, and the track itself is covered with boxing or hidden in a ceiling recess.

Glass partitions in aluminium framing

We build the partition from 8–10 mm toughened glass in aluminium framing along the floor, the ceiling and the walls. The door in it is either hinged or sliding. Once glass has been toughened it can't be cut or drilled, so the holes for the handle and hinges are made at the factory to our drawing, and we take the measurements from the finished floor and ceiling.

The framing can be black with glazing bars for a loft look, or slim and in the colour of the wall. If there is a bedroom behind the glass, the glass is frosted or covered with film. Solid glass up to the ceiling cuts the sleeping area off from the air, so we leave a gap under the ceiling or bring a fresh air supply into it. How to fit the bed, the kitchen and the air conditioner into one room is described on the page about studio apartment renovation.

We fix the top profile to the floor slab. Under a stretch ceiling the partition goes in before the membrane, and the wall profile is then brought up to it on both sides. In a plasterboard ceiling we build a batten or a profile into the frame along the line of the partition while the frame is being put together.

A wide opening: sliding and bi-fold systems

An opening more than two metres wide between the kitchen and the living room is closed with a multi-panel sliding system or with a bi-fold system, which folds into a stack against the wall and frees up almost the whole opening.

The bottom track is recessed into the floor: we leave a groove for it in the screed, or set it to the finished floor level before the floor covering goes down. So a system like this is chosen before the rough work, and it is priced for the opening as a whole.

How much sliding doors and glass partitions cost in Batumi

A glass partition in aluminium or steel framing costs from 830 to 1,200 ₾ per m², installed: the price covers the glass, the framing, the seals and the installation. Doors are priced per item: a door on a surface-mounted track, with the leaf, mechanism and installation, costs from 1,500 to 2,040 ₾, and a pocket door with its cassette from 3,240 to 4,560 ₾. If you have bought the door or partition yourself, installation costs from 300 to 420 ₾ per item, which is labour only.

The price goes up with a door in a glass partition, frosted or laminated glass, glazing bars, a high ceiling and a bottom track recessed into the floor. A fixed clear partition between two solid walls comes out cheaper. Taking down a section of wall, boarding the cassette and finishing the wall around a pocket door are priced in the estimate: the amount of work depends on whether the cassette goes into a new partition or an existing wall. The final cost is set after the site measurement and once the estimate is agreed.

What we check at sign-off

The leaf runs its full travel without jerking, the soft-close catches it gently at the end, the closed door doesn't rock, and the gaps around it are even. We look at the glass against the light: no chips on the edges, no scratches on the surface, and a toughening stamp in the corner, or a document from the factory confirming that the glass is toughened. A hinged leaf doesn't sag.

The first roller adjustment is often needed a few months after installation. We record the make of the mechanism, the dimensions and the type of glass in the handover file: if the glass is ever broken, a new pane can be ordered from this data in the right size straight away.