Gates

The most famous gates in history were perhaps the impenetrable gates of the ancient city of Troy, which were fatally opened to allow in the infamous Trojan Horse. You may not have a need for gates quite that large, but you have a lot of choices to make nevertheless.

When it comes to gates, you need to pick the ones that are best for you and your home. Your gate is the first thing that people encounter when they come to your house and it says a lot about you – how you feel about security, whether your tastes are light-hearted and decorative or solid and dependable. Your gates are the boundary of your world and gives you a sense of security. We feel safer and ‘home’ as soon as we close the gate behind us and head for the front door.

Gates can help you reflect an era, style or historical reference depending on your home and your personal taste. A gate with bluestone pillars reflects permanency and perhaps a sense of old world grandeur. Timber gates can be traditional and formal, with decorative federation scrolls; or they can be basic and functional, simple treated pine struts, for example. Automatic metal sliding gates can give your home a sense of modernity as they slide open to allow your car entry.

The most important thing to remember when you buy a gate is does it fit in with the house behind it? There’s no point having a beautiful Queenslander with lots of wooden fretwork if you are going to stick a $50 aluminium tubing gate from the hardware store in front of it. Your gate is an entrance to your space, and it should reflect the home that it protects.