Window Pane Full Length Mirror 180 x 90cm

Two grids share the window style. The Window Pane uses a small number of large panes, the proportion of a 1930s steel factory window; the Lattice Window at the same 180 x 90cm and the same £299.95 doubles the bars so the panes are smaller and the frame reads as a finer, busier pattern, closer to a leaded cottage window. Both lay their bars over one continuous sheet of glass, so the reflection behind is whole; the difference is how much frame you see and how much the view is broken up. In a hallway where the mirror faces a door full of coats and shoes, the plain grid keeps the reflection in a few calm panels; in a big room with plain walls the lattice gives the eye more to hold. There is no difference in the glass, the construction or the price, so pick on the room.

This is also the design the maker hand-welds and finishes so the bar joints barely show, which is the thing to look for on any window mirror, because glued or roughly welded joints are what lift and chip on cheaper versions.

Most British halls are about a metre wide, which rules out leaning anything and makes a 90cm wide mirror the widest that will sit flat on the long wall without dominating. Hung with its bottom edge 20cm off the floor, a 180 x 90 mirror has its glass topping out at 200cm, which shows anyone to about 205cm head to toe for the last look on the way out, and faces the daylight from the door glass back down the corridor; that is the trick the window style was invented for, a window where there is none. A window mirror 180 x 90cm hung in a hall wants a clear stretch of wall a little over 90cm wide with no coat hooks on it, and black, because black reads as architecture and hides the fingerprints a hallway collects. In a living room or dining room the same mirror hung opposite a real window doubles the light from it; in a bedroom it sits beside the wardrobe only if the room is over 3m long.

Float glass weighs 2.5kg per square metre per millimetre, so the sheet in a 180cm mirror this wide is 16.2kg and the hand-welded frame with its bars and the backing are the other 11.4kg. At 27.6kg this is above the line where our fixing rule for plasterboard becomes timber or masonry and never board alone: two nylon plugs and screws rated above the weight into brick or block, wood screws into two timber studs, or a batten screwed across two studs where the stud spacing does not match the two hanging points already on the back. Dot-and-dab plasterboard wants long frame fixings through the board and the cavity into the masonry. No cavity anchors.

A window grid shows a lean of half a degree that a plain mirror would hide, so mark both fixing points with a level, hang it with two people lifting from the outer frame and never the bars, hook both points on before anyone lets go, and check the top bar before you tighten. Leaning is possible in a dressing room or living room with felt pads and an anti-tip strap or a screw eye and cable at the top fitted on day one, but a 15 to 20mm frame has little footprint and a knocked window mirror goes rather than wobbles, so in a hall it hangs. The hanging guide covers each wall; the securing guide covers the strap.

A black window pane mirror is the one most people picture, because the frame reads as a window and windows are not usually gold; matt black on a white or pale wall is the classic contrast, and it hides the fingerprints a mirror this size collects at the point where you grab it to hang it. A gold window pane mirror in satin champagne-brass reads as a decorative screen rather than a window, warms sage, navy and cream rooms, and drifts to warm silver on pure white. Same hand-welded steel, same powder coat, same £299.95. The two-tone black frame with gold bars exists on this design at the 180 x 105cm size. The black full length mirror and gold full length mirror pages make each case, and the window mirror page has all 14 window designs and sizes.

The plain grid is the easier of the two window styles to keep: a dry microfibre cloth lifts dust from glass and bars in a minute, and for marks a cloth dampened with glass cleaner and folded over a finger does each large pane in a few strokes. Do not spray the whole face; liquid pools at the bar edges and runs into the join where the backing lives. Nothing abrasive on the powder coat, and a matt black or satin gold touch-up pen hides a scratch through it from two paces. The cleaning guide has the streak-free method.

Same size and price, different grid: the Lattice Window 180 x 90cm at 27.9kg is the finer pattern. Same grid, curved top: the Arched Window 180 x 90cm at 27.3kg and £339.95 is the plain grid under an arch, for a landing or a bedroom rather than a straight hall. Other sizes of this design: the 180 x 105cm at 31.2kg and £339.95 adds the black-and-gold two-tone and shows two people side by side; the 200 x 120cm at 38.5kg and £399.95 reflects a wall and wants 2.2m of clear height. There is no 150 x 60cm Window Pane; the compact window mirrors are the two lattice designs.

Dispatched within one working day from UK stock and delivered in two to seven working days on a two-person service, free to mainland UK, offshore postcodes quoted by email. One carton: the mirror with its hanging hardware fitted and the safety backing behind the glass, no plugs, screws or strap. Open it the day it arrives with the carton upright and someone steadying it, check every pane for a crack, run a hand along the bars for a loose joint, look at the frame corners for chips in the powder coat, and photograph anything wrong with the carton and the label within 24 hours; a replacement is dispatched free and the damaged one stays with you. Change of mind is 14 days, unused and in its packaging, at your carriage cost. The delivery and returns pages have the detail; every mirror we sell is on the full length mirrors page.