News & Insights

Every Fairco window and door begins life in our production facility in County Antrim. It is where raw profiles become finished products, where design specifications are translated into precise, measurable outcomes, and where quality is built in rather than inspected afterwards. For over 35 years, manufacturing in-house has been central to how Fairco operates, and it remains the single biggest reason we can deliver consistent performance across almost 40,000 homes.

Why in-house manufacturing matters

Many window and door companies source finished products from third-party fabricators. Fairco does not. By controlling the entire production process under one roof, we maintain direct oversight of every stage, from material selection and profile cutting through to glazing, hardware fitting, and final quality checks.

This matters because a window is not a single component. It is a system. The frame, glazing, seals, hardware, and their assembly all determine how the finished product performs in your home. When one company is responsible for all of those elements, there is nowhere for standards to slip between handoffs. What is designed and measured is exactly what is produced.

Materials and precision

Fairco uses the highest-grade uPVC available for domestic applications. Profiles are cut, reinforced, and welded using CNC-controlled machinery to ensure tight tolerances and consistent frame geometry across every unit. This precision directly affects how well seals compress, how smoothly hardware operates, and how effectively the window performs thermally over its lifetime.

Glazing units are specified to match the performance requirements of each project, whether that is high-performance double glazing or triple glazing for maximum thermal efficiency. Hardware is selected and fitted to complement the frame and sash weight, ensuring smooth, reliable operation and PAS 24:2022 certified security across the full range.

From the factory to your home

The advantage of in-house manufacturing extends beyond the factory floor. Because Fairco also employs its own survey and installation teams, there is a single chain of responsibility from the first consultation through to the finished installation. Your windows and doors are surveyed by our team, built to those exact measurements in Antrim, and installed by professionals who understand the product because they work with it every day.

This integrated approach, covering design, manufacture, and installation, is what separates Fairco from companies that assemble or resell products made elsewhere. It is also what allows us to stand behind every product with a 10-year manufacturer’s guarantee.

See it for yourself

Our Santry and Deansgrange showrooms display the full range of products manufactured at the Antrim facility, including Performance uPVC, OMNIA Flush, aluminium, and sash windows, in a wide selection of colours, finishes, and specifications. It is the best way to experience the quality of what comes out of our production line before it goes into your home.

Book a free consultation to discuss your project with the Fairco team.

Working from home is no longer a temporary arrangement. For hundreds of thousands of people across Ireland, the home office is now a permanent part of daily life. Whether it is a converted spare bedroom, a garden room extension, or a dedicated space in an attic conversion, the room you work in needs to support focus, comfort, and productivity for eight or more hours a day. Windows and doors play a bigger role in that than most people realise.

Natural light and where it falls

Good natural light is one of the most important factors in a comfortable workspace. It reduces eye strain, supports alertness, and makes a small room feel significantly more open. The size, position, and orientation of your windows all influence how much usable daylight reaches your desk throughout the day.

South and east-facing windows bring the most natural light during working hours, but they can also cause glare on screens if not managed well. The right glazing specification helps here. Low-emissivity coatings reduce solar heat gain without blocking visible light, keeping the room bright but comfortable. For rooms with large glazed areas, such as garden office extensions, sliding doors or bi-fold doors with slim aluminium frames maximise the glass area and flood the space with daylight.

Ventilation that works around you

Fresh air matters when you are spending a full day in one room. Stale, poorly ventilated spaces lead to fatigue, poor concentration, and that sluggish feeling by mid-afternoon. Tilt-and-turn windows are particularly well suited to home offices. The tilt position allows a steady flow of fresh air from the top of the sash without creating a draught across your desk or letting in rain. It also keeps the window secure while open, which matters if your office is on the ground floor.

Built-in trickle vents offer background ventilation without needing to open the window at all, useful during colder months when you want fresh air but not the temperature drop. More on how ventilation and energy efficiency work together is covered in our practical tips guide.

Keeping noise out

Concentration depends on a quiet environment. If your home office faces a busy road, a school, or a neighbour’s garden, external noise can make focused work difficult. Glazing specification has a direct impact on how much sound enters the room. Thicker glass, asymmetric pane configurations, wider cavities, and laminated glass all improve acoustic performance. For home offices on noisier elevations, specifying triple glazing or an acoustic laminated option can make a measurable difference to how the room sounds during the working day.

Frame quality and installation also matter. Even the best glass will underperform if seals are poorly compressed or if there are gaps around the frame. Precision manufacturing and professional installation ensure the acoustic performance tested in the factory is delivered in your home.

Thermal comfort through the day

A room that is too cold in the morning and too warm by afternoon is not a productive workspace. High-performance glazing with low U-values keeps the temperature stable without over-reliance on heating or cooling. This is especially important in smaller rooms and extensions where a single window or door opening accounts for a large proportion of the wall area. Well-specified windows reduce heat loss in winter and limit overheating in summer, keeping the room comfortable across the full working day.

The window behind you matters too

With video calls now part of the daily routine, your home office window is not just functional, it is your professional backdrop. The style of window in the frame behind you makes an impression, and this is where sash windows stand apart. The proportions, slim sightlines, and period detailing of a well-made sash window bring a sense of character and distinction to a room. For period properties, a Heritage Sash window with run-through horns and a deep bottom rail adds an architectural quality that elevates the entire space. It is a subtle difference, but in a room you spend eight hours a day in, and that colleagues and clients see on screen, it is one worth considering.

Specifying for your workspace

If you are converting a room, building an extension, or simply upgrading the windows in an existing home office, it is worth thinking about light, air, noise, and temperature together rather than in isolation. The right glazing, frame type, and opening configuration can address all four, turning a room that is adequate into one that actively supports how you work.

Fairco’s team can advise on the best combination of products for your workspace, whether that is a single window replacement or a fully glazed garden office. Book a free consultation to discuss your project.

If you live near a busy road, a flight path, or even a lively neighbourhood, noise is something you deal with every day. It affects sleep, concentration, and the overall comfort of your home. While most people associate new windows with better insulation and lower energy bills, the right glazing specification can also make a significant difference to how much external noise enters your home.

How glazing reduces sound

Sound travels as vibration. When it hits a pane of glass, the glass vibrates and transmits that energy to the air on the other side. The goal of acoustic glazing is to interrupt that transfer as effectively as possible. Several factors determine how well a glazing unit performs acoustically, and understanding them helps explain why not all double or triple-glazed windows deliver the same results.

Glass thickness is one of the most important variables. Thicker glass has more mass and absorbs more sound energy before transmitting it. However, every pane of glass has a natural resonant frequency at which it actually amplifies certain sounds rather than blocking them. This is known as the coincidence effect, and it is why using panes of different thicknesses in a sealed unit is so effective. When the outer pane resonates at one frequency and the inner pane at another, neither frequency passes through cleanly. Asymmetric glazing, for example, a 6mm outer pane paired with a 4mm inner pane, consistently outperforms units where both panes are the same thickness.

Cavity size and gas fill

The gap between the panes also plays a role. A wider cavity gives sound waves more distance to lose energy before reaching the inner glass. For thermal performance, cavities are typically 16mm to 20mm and filled with argon gas. Acoustically, a wider cavity improves low-frequency performance, which is particularly relevant for traffic and transport noise. However, there is a balance to strike. Very wide cavities increase the overall unit thickness and can affect how the unit fits within the frame profile, so glazing specification always involves trade-offs between thermal, acoustic, and structural requirements.

Laminated glass for acoustic control

For homes where noise is a serious concern, laminated glass offers an additional level of performance. Laminated glass consists of two layers of glass bonded together with a plastic interlayer, typically PVB. This interlayer absorbs vibration, dampening sound transmission more effectively than a standard pane of equivalent thickness. Specialist acoustic interlayers can push noise reduction even further, making laminated glass particularly effective against both traffic noise and higher-frequency sounds like aircraft.

A standard double-glazed unit might achieve a noise reduction of around 25 to 30 dB. With the right combination of asymmetric glass thicknesses, a wider cavity, and laminated glass, that figure can rise to 40 dB or more. To put that in context, a 10 dB reduction is perceived by the human ear as roughly halving the volume. Moving from 25 dB to 40 dB represents a dramatic change in how your home sounds and feels.

It is not just about the glass

Glazing specification is critical, but the frame and installation matter too. Sound will find the weakest point in any assembly. Poorly sealed frames, gaps around the perimeter, or inadequate compression of weather seals will all undermine the acoustic performance of even the best glazing. This is why precision manufacturing and professional installation are essential. A window is only as quiet as its weakest seal.

Trickle vents also deserve consideration. While they are important for ventilation and air quality, standard trickle vents can allow some sound transmission. Acoustically rated vents are available for homes where noise is a primary concern.

Choosing the right specification for your home

There is no single glazing configuration that suits every situation. The type of noise you are exposed to, whether low-frequency traffic rumble, mid-range neighbourhood activity, or high-frequency aircraft, affects which combination of glass thickness, cavity width, and interlayer type will be most effective. Orientation matters too, as windows facing a noise source need a different specification to those on a quieter elevation.

Fairco’s team can help you assess your noise exposure and recommend a glazing specification that balances acoustic performance with thermal efficiency and security. Whether you are upgrading a few key windows or replacing the full house, getting the glazing right makes a measurable difference to how your home sounds and feels.

Book a free consultation to discuss your options, or visit our showrooms to learn more about Fairco’s glazing and window systems.

The appearance of a window matters. It is one of the most visible elements of any home, inside and out. While thermal performance, security, and durability rightly dominate the specification conversation, the surface finish is what homeowners see and touch every day. Spectral is a surface technology developed by VEKA, one of the world’s leading uPVC profile manufacturers, that brings a genuinely new aesthetic dimension to uPVC windows and doors. Fairco is proud to offer Spectral across our Performance uPVC casement range.

What makes Spectral different

Spectral is not a standard foil or paint finish. It is a multi-layer system that combines through-dyed PVC film with a hardened coating layer, creating a surface that is fundamentally different from conventional uPVC finishes in both look and feel.

The result is an ultra-matt surface with a soft, velvety texture. There is no sheen, no gloss, and no plastic appearance. In person, it looks and feels closer to a powder-coated aluminium or a high-end composite than a traditional uPVC frame. For homeowners and architects who have historically avoided uPVC on aesthetic grounds, Spectral changes the conversation entirely.

Built to perform, not just to impress

A premium surface finish is only worthwhile if it lasts. Spectral is engineered for long-term durability in real-world conditions. The hardened coating layer provides exceptionally high resistance to scratches, abrasion, and chemical exposure. It is also dust-repellent and features an anti-fingerprint effect, which means the surface stays cleaner for longer with minimal maintenance.

VEKA backs the finish with a 10-year weather resistance guarantee, and independent testing confirms performance that meets and exceeds RAL quality standards under demanding environmental simulations. In Ireland’s wet, wind-driven climate, that level of resilience matters.

Design flexibility without compromise

Spectral is available in a range of contemporary colours, allowing homeowners to personalise their windows to suit both modern and traditional exteriors. Combined with the thermal performance and security credentials of Fairco’s Performance uPVC range, including double and triple glazing options and PAS 24 certified security, it is possible to achieve a high-design aesthetic without compromising on any functional requirement.

For those who want to see and feel the difference firsthand, Spectral samples are available in our Santry and Deansgrange showrooms. It is one of those finishes that photographs well but truly needs to be experienced in person to appreciate the quality.

Explore Spectral with Fairco

Spectral represents a meaningful step forward in what uPVC windows can look and feel like. If you are planning a window upgrade and want a finish that delivers on both aesthetics and performance, it is well worth exploring.

Book a free consultation with the Fairco team to discuss how Spectral can work for your home.

Most homeowners know that double or triple glazing improves insulation. Fewer know that the component sitting between the panes of glass plays a critical role in how well that glazing actually performs. The spacer bar is one of the most overlooked parts of a window, but it has a direct impact on heat loss, condensation, and overall U-value.

What a spacer bar does

A spacer bar is the strip that runs around the perimeter of a sealed glazing unit, holding the panes of glass apart at a precise, uniform distance. The gap it creates is filled with an insulating gas, typically argon, which slows heat transfer between the inner and outer panes. The spacer also contains a desiccant material that absorbs any residual moisture inside the cavity, keeping the glass clear over time.

In short, the spacer bar defines the structure of the sealed unit. Its material, design, and thermal properties all influence how the glazing performs at its most vulnerable point: the edge.

The problem with traditional aluminium spacers

For many years, aluminium was the standard material for spacer bars. It is strong, easy to manufacture, and structurally effective. However, aluminium is also highly thermally conductive. Heat travels through it easily, creating a thermal bridge at the edge of the glass where the spacer sits.

This thermal bridge causes the internal glass surface temperature to drop significantly at the perimeter. When warm, moist indoor air meets that cold edge, the result is condensation. In severe cases, persistent edge condensation can lead to mould growth, damage to window reveals, and degradation of the sealed unit itself. The cold edge also reduces the effective U-value of the window, meaning more heat is lost through the glazing than the centre-pane figure alone would suggest.

How warm-edge spacers solve this

A warm-edge spacer bar is made from materials with much lower thermal conductivity than aluminium, typically composite polymers, structural foam, or stainless steel hybrids. By reducing the rate at which heat transfers through the spacer, the internal glass edge temperature stays higher. This has two measurable effects.

First, the risk of condensation at the glass perimeter is substantially reduced. Independent testing has shown that warm-edge spacers can improve internal edge temperatures by up to 65% compared to aluminium, and reduce condensation occurrence by as much as 70%. Second, the overall U-value of the window improves. Depending on the glazing configuration, warm-edge spacers can improve the whole-window U-value by between 5% and 18%, a meaningful gain that contributes directly to energy performance and BER outcomes.

Why it matters for your home

In Ireland’s damp, mild climate, condensation around window edges is a common complaint, particularly in kitchens, bathrooms, and bedrooms where humidity levels are higher. Many homeowners assume this is simply a feature of living in a wet climate, but in most cases it is a symptom of poor edge-of-glass performance. Upgrading to windows with warm-edge spacer technology addresses the root cause.

For anyone considering double or triple glazing, the spacer bar specification is worth asking about. It is not always highlighted in quotes, but it makes a real difference to comfort, maintenance, and long-term glazing performance.

A detail that matters at Fairco

At Fairco, warm-edge spacer technology is part of how we approach glazing specification as a complete system. Combined with low-emissivity coatings, gas-filled cavities, and precision manufacturing, every component works together to deliver consistent thermal performance across the full window, not just at the centre of the glass.

If you would like to understand more about how glazing specification affects your home’s comfort and energy performance, book a free consultation or visit our showrooms to discuss your options with the Fairco team.