The UK marketplace offers a wealth of variety in design, material of construction and glazing of the domestic greenhouse.
To avoid poor performance of your greenhouse some of the following rules are recommended.
Siting your greenhouse: For convenience, position your greenhouse as near to your house as possible without falling into its shadow. Avoid placing near trees or in the shadow of buildings, walls, etc., or in extremely exposed positions. Ideally, you should site a free-standing greenhouse with its ridge running from east to west since this gives better light penetration in the winter when the sun is low in the sky. A lean-to greenhouse is ideally be sited against a south facing wall.
Glazing: Remarkably, in many instances horticultural glass may still be specified. This glass is easily to distinguish from safety glass by its sharp edge and absence of markings. Generally, horticultural glass is offered in smaller panes often overlapping. Inherently over-lapping glass supported by little more than a couple of retaining clips is the Achilles heal of the aluminium greenhouse and can very often result in the glass falling out in the gales. Predominately full-size sheets of toughened glass is most desirable since it is easy to clean, adds rigidity and weight to the frame and if broken shatters into safe pieces. Polycarbonate and acrylic glazing whilst sharing some of the properties of toughened glass tends to be light-weight and so increasing the potential for wind damage.
Materials of construction: Professional gardeners agree that the heat retentive properties of a timber greenhouse far outweigh the occasional maintenance. Aseptically a timber greenhouse is a more pleasing feature of any garden. Brands such as Alton Greenhouses offer their buildings only in Canadian Western Red Cedar a naturally rot inhibiting wood whilst you may also wish to consider a tanalised or pressure impregnated timber which are on the whole cheaper than their cedar counterparts. Many aluminium greenhouses can now be specified in a variety of powder-coated coloured finishes, the process of coating is such that maintenance has been reduced almost to nil. Aluminium greenhouses are fit for purpose but in the absence of heating don’t expect your season to extend quite as far as a wooden greenhouse.
Design: loosely speaking you are offered ‘feature’ hexagonal/octagonal/heptagonal shaped buildings which are compact, attractive and tall, free-standing and lean-to designs. Very few greenhouses are now offered in ‘Dutch Light’ styles (those whose sides slope outward of the base) yet this design will allow more light into the greenhouse and thus extends the growing season. See the Alton ‘Amateur’ or Lowfield FAWT ‘Solar’ greenhouse should this design appeal.
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