Survey, specification support and shop drawings for the glazing scope
The cheapest moment to change a detail is before anything is fabricated. Moving a line on a drawing costs minutes. Remaking a fire-rated assembly that turned out to be beyond its tested size, or a landmark window that will not be approved, costs weeks and a great deal of money.
We would rather be in the conversation while the drawings are open than be handed a finished specification and asked to price it.
To be clear about scope: we are a glazing contractor, not an architecture practice. We do not produce stamped architectural drawings, file permits as design professional, or perform structural or MEP design — those require a licensed Registered Architect or Professional Engineer, and your project needs one. What we do is everything on the glazing side of that line, and we do it in support of your design team rather than instead of them.
Confusion about this wastes time on projects, so it is worth setting out plainly.
| Your Architect or Engineer | Us | |
|---|---|---|
| Design intent | Sets it — appearance, layout, performance targets | Advises on what is achievable within it |
| Stamped drawings | Produces them — requires licensure | Supplies the data they need for the glazing scope |
| Code compliance filing | Files and certifies | Provides assembly performance figures for the schedule |
| Shop drawings | Reviews and approves | Produces them — fabrication and installation detail |
| Measured survey of openings | Rarely — works from record drawings | Does it — actual conditions, opening by opening |
| Product selection | Specifies performance, sometimes a named product | Identifies what meets it and what it will cost |
The division that matters most is design drawings versus shop drawings. Your architect draws design intent — what the building should be. We draw how the glazing is actually built and installed to achieve it: profile sections, connection details, anchor locations, sequence, tolerances.
Those are different documents with different purposes, and a project needs both. An architect's elevation showing a window is not a fabrication instruction, and our shop drawing is not a design proposal.
On a new building the openings will be what the drawings say. On an existing New York building they will not.
Masonry openings shift and settle. Nothing is square. No two windows on a floor are quite the same dimension. Original drawings, where they exist, record what was intended rather than what was built, and a century of alterations sits between the two.
We survey every opening rather than measuring a sample and multiplying. On a hundred-window building that is slower, and it is the reason units arrive fitting properly rather than needing packing out with wide trim that makes new windows look wrong.
For restoration work we also record the existing profile — the muntin section, the sightline, the meeting rail depth — because that is what a preservation approval will be judged against. See permits and approvals.
This is the most valuable thing we do at design stage, and it is worth being specific about what we are looking for.
Sizes beyond tested limits. Every listed assembly has maximum tested dimensions. Fire-rated assemblies in particular cannot be resized in the field — a listing is a listing. A drawing showing a rated opening larger than anything tested is not a detail problem, it is a redesign.
Frame depths that will not take the specified unit. A triple-glazed or acoustic build-up is thicker and heavier than the frame may accept. On landmark work where the existing frame stays, this constraint decides the glass specification.
Hardware outside a listing. On rated and security assemblies, hardware is part of what was tested. Substituting a closer or a hinge because it matches the rest of the building can void the rating.
Thermal performance that will not be met. Code compliance uses whole-assembly figures. A good sealed unit in a poorly performing frame can still fail the schedule, and that shows up at inspection rather than at order. See Low-E glass.
Details that cannot be waterproofed. A junction drawn without a route for water to drain back out will leak, however well it is sealed. See waterproofing.
We raise these at submittal rather than at inspection. That is a conversation about a drawing; the alternative is a conversation about a completed facade.
Shop drawings are what we produce for approval before anything is cut. They show the fabricator and the installer exactly what is being made and how it goes in.
A set typically covers overall elevations with opening references, profile sections through head, jamb, sill and meeting rails, connection and anchor details, glazing details showing the makeup and its bedding, hardware locations and preparations, and the interface with adjacent construction — masonry, cladding, or an existing frame being retained.
They go to your architect or engineer for review. Comments come back, we revise, and fabrication starts against an approved set. Nothing is cut before that approval, because a change after fabrication means remaking rather than adjusting.
On custom fabrication these drawings then drive the work directly — profiles cut and machined from the same dimensioned data rather than from someone reading a drawing and transcribing numbers.
A common misconception is that the drawings are the whole story. They are not.
Drawings are graphic: they show where things go and how big they are. Specifications are narrative: they define quality of materials and methods of installation. The two are complementary and a project needs both.
Without a specification, a drawing showing an insulated unit says nothing about which coating, whose glass, what fill rate, or which spacer — and those decisions account for most of the performance difference between two units that look identical on paper.
Where we support a specification, the useful content is: named products or performance figures with the standards they are tested against, glass makeup described surface by surface, hardware schedules, finish specification including the AAMA grade for the exposure, and installation requirements including the waterproofing sequence.
See glass types and specifications for how a glazing specification is assembled.
Before fabrication, the design team reviews and approves what is proposed. A submittal package from us generally includes shop drawings, manufacturer product data, assembly performance figures for code compliance, finish samples where appearance is being matched, and warranty documentation.
Preparing this properly matters for the programme. An incomplete submittal generates rounds of queries, and each round restarts the review clock — the same dynamic that makes board approvals take a year instead of two months.
We submit complete.
Earlier than most people do. Specifically:
Before the drawings are finalised on anything custom, landmark or fire-rated, because in those categories what is achievable is constrained by tested listings and approval requirements rather than by design preference.
Before a performance specification is written, so the numbers in it are ones an available assembly can actually meet.
Before a programme is set, because custom fabrication and specialist glazing have lead times that do not compress, and approvals on landmark work regularly take longer than manufacturing.
What we need to start: drawings or a description of the openings, the performance or code requirements, whether landmarks or a board approval applies, and photographs of anything being matched.
Call 929-235-1233 or send us what you have — including if what you have is a sketch and a problem.
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Before the drawings are finalised. The cheapest time to change a detail is before anything is fabricated, particularly on custom, landmark and fire-rated work where tested assemblies and approval requirements constrain what is achievable.
Yes. Fabrication and installation drawings for approval, along with product data, schedules and the performance figures needed for code compliance.
Because openings are rarely what the drawings say, particularly in older buildings. A measured survey of actual conditions is what allows units to be fabricated to fit.
Yes. We flag details that will not achieve what they need to — spans beyond tested limits, frame depths that will not accept the specified unit, hardware outside a listing — at submittal stage rather than at inspection.
Tell us about the opening and we will specify it for you.
