Avante garage doors

Avante is the full-view door. Clopay builds it from an aluminum frame with glass in every opening, so the garage door reads as a wall of glass instead of a set of panels. During the day it lets daylight into the garage. After dark, with the lights on inside, it glows from the street. It is a strong look, and it suits houses that have already committed to a modern or contemporary design: black window frames, flat or low rooflines, mixed siding with long horizontal lines. On a traditional house it tends to look out of place, and a panel door is the better choice there.

The frame is where the character is. Clopay lists the standard Avante frame as an aluminum grid that gives the glass a firm, even line, and it also offers a slimmer-frame variant called Avante Sleek. The slimmer version thins the lines of the grid for a lighter, more minimal face. The difference is easy to miss in a photo and obvious in person, so we suggest comparing the two with a sample in your hand.

Glass changes how the garage behaves. Insulated glass is available, and it is worth asking about if the garage is attached to the house or shares a wall with a room, because a large area of glass lets in heat as well as light, and Triangle summers are long. Privacy is the other question to settle early. Think about what you keep in the garage, which way the door faces and how much you want a passer-by to see. The glass choices are shown with samples at the consultation.

It also helps to picture the inside. With a glass door, the shelving, bikes and workbench along the front wall become part of the view from the street, especially at night. Owners who like the look usually tidy the garage to match, or keep the lights low. A door this size is also heavy, so the springs are balanced to the actual weight when we install it. If a fully clear door feels like too much, ask what glass options Clopay offers for more privacy and what each one costs you in daylight. We would rather you settle that on a sample than on a catalog page.

Frame colors come from Clopay's sample range, and we bring samples so you can judge them against your trim, siding and windows. A dark frame sharpens a modern house. A lighter frame is gentler and tends to disappear into white or gray trim.

Avante sits at the top of the Clopay collections on cost. Full glass and an aluminum frame are a different class of door from a stamped steel panel, and the price climbs further with insulated glass and with a wider opening. Clopay's design tool, linked on this page, will place an Avante on a photo of your house. The free consultation is the better test: we measure the opening and headroom, bring frame and glass samples and give you a firm installed price.