Gazebo Screen & Clear Vinyl in Côte-des-Neiges–Notre-Dame-de-Grâce

Gazebos in Côte-des-Neiges–Notre-Dame-de-Grâce

In Côte-des-Neiges–Notre-Dame-de-Grâce, the gazebo is a matter of cottage backyards and plex terraces. The English-style cottages of Notre-Dame-de-Grâce have decent-sized yards framed by hedges and garages, and a century-old house never came with a gazebo: the one there was added — a retail gazebo set on the deck, or a wooden structure designed for the yard. Either way, it is the panels that age, not the house, and film that has sat through several Montreal winters is generally ready to be replaced pane by pane. The screening usually follows a few seasons behind it, sagging or torn at a low corner.

The brick duplexes and triplexes of 1910-1940 raise a different question: where does a gazebo go when the yard is narrow and the unit is upstairs? On the rear terrace, or on the roof terrace when there is one. The gazebo is then a small retail model, or a pergola with panels, and everything in it goes up and comes down by the outside staircase. The big post-war apartment towers of Côte-des-Neiges have next to no private gazebos; when a common terrace carries one, it falls to the building manager. That staircase shapes the whole job, from what gets taken down to how it travels.

Screens and vinyl: what gives out in Côte-des-Neiges–Notre-Dame-de-Grâce

On a plex terrace gazebo, film and screening live higher and less sheltered than in a yard: wind funnelled between buildings beats on the film, which yellows, stiffens and splits at the corner of a pane. We replace it cut to the exact size of the pane, in the original frame. The mesh on a low panel sags or tears; we rescreen it in its frame with new spline. On a wooden structure added to a cottage yard, the openings are one of a kind, the mesh is stretched and held by the groove or by wood strips, and the film is cut to a template — nothing is pre-cut.

Structure and access in Côte-des-Neiges–Notre-Dame-de-Grâce

Access dictates everything here. On a roof terrace or a third-floor deck, each panel goes up and down the outside staircase, flat, protected, and sometimes with two people when the panel is large. So we take down only what needs redoing, panel by panel, rather than the whole gazebo. In cottage yards, the way in is the garage driveway or through the house, and a wooden structure is handled in place when its panels are screwed to the frame. In a rented plex, it is the owner who authorizes moving panels through the shared staircase; that permission is obtained before anyone starts climbing.

Wind, sun, insects: choosing in Côte-des-Neiges–Notre-Dame-de-Grâce

In the dense city, wind comes not off a body of water but through the corridors between buildings, and it hits hard on a raised terrace: the film on a rooftop gazebo comes down in spring if the gazebo is a summer room, and aluminum mesh holds the exposed side. The unobstructed rooftop sun yellows film faster than in a shaded yard. At ground level, in cottage yards closed in by hedges and garages, air barely moves and damp lingers under the gazebo roof; standard fibreglass is enough on the upper panels, and pet-resistant mesh belongs on the low panel facing the garage driveway.