Parapet height window, balcony & railing – What to consider?
If the window parapet is bricked during the carcass, this is done in 12.5cm steps. If the parapet would be bricked 1m high and still about 18cm floor construction (screed with underfloor heating, living room ventilation, flooring) are deducted, then I would have a parapet height of 82cm. If this is too little, we could go half a stone higher and would then have 94.5cm parapet height. Is that correct, you can only choose between these two dimensions? Actually, we would like to have 90cm, which is then probably not possible, right?
Answers
Much higher than 90 cm I would consider too high in children's rooms, bedrooms, and living rooms. It's not just the view height or drop height (on the top floor) that counts, but also the entire window area.
It also depends on how big your entire window area is, that is, whether the room may still need the extra light that is created by the lowered height of the parapet. This usually results in larger windows. Another point, from my perspective, is that with a relatively low opening you can still see out the window while "sitting" on the couch, and tall balustrades seem rather uncomfortable.
I found an approximate value online of at least 1/8 of the window area over the base area, but I've also read that I currently recommend larger windows than 1/8 of the base area. Does anyone have a more current test?
I have calculated all the windows in our planned home. In the first and second floor hallway and utility room we didn't reach the 1/8 standard, we were just below that, in all the other rooms the window area was very clearly above the standard value, in the living-dining-room-kitchen it was almost 3 times the area. In the hallway, we will still work with glass doors, since large windows are not possible there, and in HWR it is not as important whether the window area will be sufficient, since there is no living area. The windows with the parapet height in question are on the top floor anyway, where the window areas in the rooms are much larger than the approximate value, so it's not as relevant here in the thread.
Last night I measured the height of the parapet in our current apartment, it's 82 cm to the bottom edge of the window sill. In my office at work, it's 101 cm. Honestly, both parapet heights are fine for me. In our house, according to the current layout, it would be something in between, with a tendency for the parapet height in the office. The advantage of the "higher" parapet is, of course, that it's easier to put a desk or dresser or whatever underneath it (the kids' room), but the advantage of the "lower" parapet would be that it's in bed. , you can see better out of the window, and the kids are less able to look outside (affects at least one of the kids' rooms and the parents' bedroom, the second kids' room also has a floor-to-ceiling window). I think we'll go to the showroom again this weekend, measure the height of the parapet at different houses, see what height we feel most comfortable at, and then decide whether to lower the parapet height or leave it that way. In the end, though, I think both heights should be fine and it's just a matter of taste, we're talking about a difference of "only" 12.5 cm!
