Overview

Century-old Piper Hall on the Loyola University campus was undergoing a complete renovation. This included replacing nearly 100 windows, and replicating their leaded, diamond-lite designs with easy-to-clean, energy-efficient versions.

Special care was taken to preserve design flourishes, such as the unusual and beloved metalwork on the front door sidelites. University staffers assumed they would be lost in the process, but Marvin Signature Services’ craftspeople felt confident they could find a way to capture the look in a simulated divided lite (SDL)—and they did. Three designs were presented and school officials fell in love with one.

Project Details

• The Signature team replicated leaded, diamond lites in easy-to-clean, energy-efficient versions by applying lead tape to both sides of the exterior pane of the insulating glass on each window—in a pattern that precisely duplicated the original.
  
  
• Factory-installed Signature casing saved hours of labor per window, resulting in consistent, high quality casing and a perfect match for the building's character and materials.
  
  
• Sidelite windows feature SDLs milled to achieve an unusual legacy design. Because of the unique sizes and shapes involved, a solid piece of aluminum billet was machined on a CNC router to achieve the perfect look.