This deals specifically with garden gate design ideas, or more specifically designing your own garden gate. Its not difficult but there is quite a bit of reading to do. As i am attempting to teach years worth of gate design experience in a single web page. Its likely best viewed on a full size screen rather than a mobile device. All images should expand to full size when clicked upon. Making it easier to see some of the smaller details of the design.
There are 3 parts which effectively make a gate design. The top of the gate or at least the decoration on the top of the gate. The frame style, not every gate is just a rectangular frame. The internal design pattern in the gate. Its all based on the idea of taking a basic size gate, knowing the price and adding everything else as “optional” extras
The top.
There are a few choices here. All drawings are based on a gate frame to fit a 900mm wide gap, with no design detail in the upright bars.
This is a plain frame with nothing on top, perfectly acceptable if you like things simple. As there is nothing there it has zero additional cost.
A simple pair of scrolls placed centre on the top of the gate. Nothing fancy or expensive adds around £6 to the cost.
A scroll top but with a ring in the centre. A small difference from the previous top design but enough to change it. Adds about £8 to a basic gate
Decorative railing heads set above each vertical bar. There is a wide selection of raling head choices. Adds around £1.50 per railing head, depending on rail head choice.
The same as the previous design with one minor exception. The hanging and closing bars extend beyond the frame to the same height as the railing heads.
Extended frame here but with scrolls connected to outer edge rather than centre. Adds £6 to cost
Arch with scroll effect, this adds quite a bit of height to any gate. As drawn is about 300mm high. Adds £35 to base cost
Full width arch. what ever the width of the gate adds half that to the height. On a 900wide gap the gate frame is about 800mm, so adds 400mm in height as is a true half ring. Adds £40 to base cost
The rail heads are priced per rail head, simply because depending on the width of the gate will determine how many upright bars there are. Also with railing heads because we offer a choice, they vary in price. £1.50 each is a good ball park figure.
As you can see all the above are just a rectangular frame, with possible top designs. Each top design creates a different look to the gate. But the frame doesn’t have to be a plain rectangle. There are other choices, but certain top designs are not compatible with some of the other frame designs.
Frame design.
So here we are talking about that basic rectangular frame The first example in our top design series.
For continuity we shall place this here. The basic rectangular frame used in so many gate designs on the internet.
The frame has a small arch shape to it. Draw back to this top is that it limits the top design to either plain as it is, or one of the rail head type designs. Adds £20 to base cost
If you take that same top shape and weld it on upside down, you create a dip. This has the same limitation as the arch frame. Adds £20 to base cost
Here 2 extra horizontal bars are welded in the frame to create a gap. This gives a more compact space in the centre but now gives a place to add an additional element of design in. Adds £30 to base cost
Instead of two gaps only 1 gap to fill in at the bottom. Adds £15 to base cost
Just the previous frame flipped over vertically to create the gap at the top.
If your preference is to one of the above 3 frame designs, you have now created a 4th element to the design, the gap. so how do you fill the gap to create a design.
A pair of scrolls to infill the gap
A mix of rings and bars
C scrolls and bars.
A point to note on double frame gates, you are reducing the size of the upright bars. To keep a gate at 3ft tall, this can mean that the uprights are reduced to a short as 500mm tall. which can cause issues attempting to fit in some of the follow bar designs.
So now we finally get to the infill.
Infill bars for gates.
These are current based on 5 simple parts. These parts can be combined to form decorative bars. Or used on there own.
A Square bar with a simple twist. minimum length for a twist is 100mm, but usually are around 200-250mm long.
Adding a twist in a bar cost £3 per twist
A 100mm ring weld into a plain bar.
Adding a ring into a bar costs £4
Basket or cage welded into a bar
Adding a cage into a bar costs £4
A pair of C scrolls welded to a bar
Adding a C scroll into a bar cost £5
2 pairs of S scrolls welded to a bar. Scrolls are very variable and you will notice as you read on further.
Adding a pair of S scrolls into a bar costs £6, there are two pairs in this bar
On there own none of these bars are outstanding, although if looking to keep things simple and the price down these are great if well position in a gate. If you start combing the bars you can get some interesting bar designs, that can really add some interest to a gate.
A note on S scrolls. They need to be a minimum of 250mm long, but the wider the scroll the longer it needs to be. This can be an issue on the double bar frames as the upright bar is shorter.
Here we have used the twist in the centre but with the addition of two rings top and bottom.
For this the twist is still central but now it is a basket top and bottom.
C scrolls top and bottom of a central twist.
S scroll top and bottom of twist
This is a variation of an S scroll
A relatively simple combination of two parts in the same bar, now creates a more interesting bar. There are quite a few permutations to this and i will try and run through them all.
Basket with double ring
Cage with double twist.
Cage with double C scroll
Cage with S scrolls
Cage with large double S scroll
C scroll as a centre decoration.
Using a ring as a centre piece
Keeping the centre plain. only 2 parts per bar
Stretching the S scrolls to full length of the bar
As before but just flipped vertically
Here you should have noticed its possible to stretch an S scroll a little to make it fit the full length of the bar. But you can see by flipping an S scroll vertically you change the look. Its all down to personal preference which way you have them there is no right and wrong.
The 3 part piece that include S scrolls really need to be in a bar ideally longer that 700mm. This might be an issue if you are using the double bar frame and keeping the height down to a 3ft tall gate. At that height you are looking at a bar height of 600mm.
This sort of thing is sometimes possible depending on size of the bar
Another weird possibility, of course you could flip the scrolls vertically on this to get yet another alternative
A thought to bear in mind. a twist and a ring. Then when put into a gate the adjacent bar is welded upside down.
When using a single item, they don’t have to be in the centre of the bar. You can off set.
As you can see with just 5 parts, there are a lot of combinations that can be achieved. I have cover perhaps the most common.
There are more in there if you want to discover them yourself.
I did say there was more combinations in there. but this one is just to explain the price system.
You have two twists at £3 each, with one basket at £4. With 2 pairs of S scrolls at £6 per pair. So the price of this bar would be £22.
If this was your only decoration in the gate then it would be an additional £22, If the gate also contain 4 ring bars at £4 each that would add another £16. Making the total £38 above the base price. It takes a little working out but is a simple system, allowing a price to be obtained for each design.