As vendor-approved supply and installation partners for the Jackloc range of window restrictors, we have worked with customers in several sectors to improve the safety and security of above-ground-level windows used by residents and visitors.
One of the notable customers we worked with throughout 2020 and 2021 was Weetwood Hall Hotel near Leeds, Yorkshire; a beautiful luxury hotel in what was once a historic 17th Century Jacobean manor house.
As a period building steeped in history and retaining a wide range of original architectural features – including distinctly styled windows and decorative plasterwork dating to the reign of Henry the VIII in many of the guest rooms, our work with Weetwood Hall required a unique approach to project management that is not always required with more modern buildings.
The Project
The hotel management wished to install 75 Jackloc window restrictors in their guest rooms in order to improve health and safety by reducing the risk of falls from height, while still allowing sufficient ventilation into each room – while also facilitating maintenance access to roof areas of the hotel when required.
As the hotel is in continuous use all year round, the project would need to be conducted while rooms were occupied and without disturbing guests, either in the rooms themselves or in the surrounding areas.
The Challenge
For our team of installation engineers at Mila Maintenance, the project presented several challenges that combined the demands of working on a sensitive heritage building, and a busy luxury hotel.
Our project plan and installation programme, therefore, had to accommodate the following:
- Customers occupy the guest rooms most of the time, with only a relatively short time period in which guests will be checking out and new guests will be checking in. Access can be gained without disturbing the occupants if installation took place during this window of time. During this time, cleaning is also required, so we needed to coordinate closely with the cleaning teams to avoid disruption when carrying out our work.
- Hotel guests are sensitive to disturbances in and around their rooms and do not expect noise from surrounding areas during their stay. Care needed to be taken, therefore, to completely minimise inconvenience to guests – carrying out our work without guests realising we were even there!
- High hygiene and safety demands – as our work took place in 2020/21 at the height of the Covid 19 pandemic, our project plan had to accommodate enhanced safety and social distancing measures, to ensure that hotel guests were physically removed from our engineers while they were working and ensuring that the working area was thoroughly sanitised before and after each installation.
- The building itself posed a challenge, as the windows were traditional steel windows with a thinner frame and profile than more modern windows. We had to work closely with Jackloc to design the best installation method for these heritage windows, and to select the most appropriate hardware for the customer’s requirements.
Solution
Our first step was to select a team of installation engineers with established experience working in occupied rooms and premises – we are fortunate to have a skilled installation department with broad industry experience in the hospitality sector.
We liaised closely with the management team at Weetwood Hall to arrange a schedule of work that enabled our team to install the new window restrictors directly after guests checked out of their rooms, leaving the rooms unoccupied for a narrow time window before cleaning.
We then worked closely with our contacts at Jackloc to identify the best screws and fixing methods to install the window restrictors in situ – given the challenges of working with heritage windows and thin window profiles.
Outcome
The full requirement of seventy-five window restrictors was installed in batches over the course of several months in order to minimise disruption – with all milestones completed on the agreed dates and within the agreed budget.
Weetwood Hall was incredibly happy with its new safety components and did not receive any complaints from guests about the project or noise created – so our efforts to complete our activities quickly, quietly, and respectfully clearly worked out well!
On our part, we enjoyed the opportunity to work with a unique, historical hotel to improve safety and help ensure that the beautiful building and grounds of Weetwood Hall can continue to be enjoyed by guests and visitors for years to come.
Many thanks to the management, front of house, and cleaning team at Weetwood Hall for accommodating our engineers, and we look forward to working with them again in the future. The client also said a few kind words as they emphasis they are happy with the work we carried out.
Discuss Your Own Project
If you’d like to find out more about Jackloc window restrictors or would like to discuss your own project, please feel free to call one of our support team today. We are happy to accommodate a wide range of assignments in the hospitality, commercial, retail, and social housing sectors throughout the UK.
