Home design and style is an always changing always moving industry with everyone having personal taste on what is in and what is out. The same can be said about Skylights! Over time the design and application of skylights have changed to follow design trends.
As part of that evolution we have also seen a change in features and benefits in skylight design. The first traditional skylights were very simplistic in design and as such not always water tight. With the improvements in raw materials and product design, modern day skylights provide enhanced lighting performance, reduced heat gain and heat loss and better-quality roof flashing design to divert water and eliminate the potential for leaks – subject to the skill and knowledge of the skylight installer.
Calidad Industries have designed skylights which better suit our harsh Aussie conditions and have them tested to Australian Standard AS4285 – skylights. Features such as a metal roof flashing to match metal roofs and provide durability, double glazed domes and diffusers to reduce heat impact in areas of the home exposed to the direct North/North western sun and highly reflective rigid or flexible light tube to provide improved light transfer into the home. (86% or 98% reflective light tube).
Different product design can also be associated with a change in home style architectural design. The demise of Australian style federation homes and the rise of modern day minimalistic design can also be linked to the slow demise of Leadlight skylight diffusers.
More and more Australian home owners want sleek minimalistic skylight finishes. This means modern design ceiling frames with double glazed Seadrift (frosted) diffuser pattern where once wooden framed Leadlight skylight ceiling diffusers were popular choice. Frosted pattern diffusers rather than prismatic pattern diffusers are becoming more popular with Leadlight now being ordered primarily as part of a home refurbishment and less as part of modern new home design.
However just like fashion trends that go in and out of popular demand and always seem to come back with a slightly modified transformation, who knows Leadlight may do the same over time!
