There are few things that a homeowner or renter notices more than an open vinyl window or patio door on an exceptionally cold or hot day. Trying to keep a stable and comfortable temperature within a home that is not properly sealed can be a massive energy drain. Forget about energy efficiency at this point, just trying to keep a constant temperature can be almost impossible. We often don’t appreciate the value that glass provides us on a day to day basis, but when we are without it, we quickly realize how important it can be.

In recent blogs here at Croft LLC, we have been exploring the history of glass making in order to understand the vinyl window making process and all that it entails. We have covered millennia of time to arrive at a somewhat modern version of glass, but we haven’t quite arrived at our finished product. Our next peek into history will take us to early America where colonists were struggling to survive and combating the elements. The first glass making factory was established in the sixteen hundreds but was short-lived due to a famine that left the people in no condition to venture into glass making and the eventual aluminum windows and vinyl windows that would come (luxurious endeavors in trying times). Several other attempts at making glass on a large scale were executed, but none with lasting success. It wasn’t until the eighteen hundreds that the first real demand for widow glass began and glass making factories really began to take stable root.

This early window glass was called crown glass and birthed our modern style of glass which finds itself in vinyl windows, patio doors, aluminum windows, and many other kinds of windows and doors. This crown glass, as it was known, was shortly replaced by cylinder glass. Cylinder glass led directly to plate glass which is what we find in vinyl windows and modern windows and doors of every kind. In our next blog we’ll look at the modern method of window making and see what sets Croft windows and doors apart.