Hidden in Plain Sight. How Sugatsune Makes Concealed Doors Simple
Elegant. Mysterious. Sophisticated. No, we’ re not talking about a Hollywood secret agent. We’ re talking about one of the hottest current trends in interior design. Hidden doors.
From walk-in wardrobes to secret closets to full-length partitions that are indistinguishable from surrounding panelling, hidden doors delight on several levels. The touch of mystery is undoubtedly part of it. Any magician will tell you how captivating the conceal-reveal dynamic can be.
But for interior designers, the appeal of a hidden door is more aesthetic. They lend themselves perfectly to contemporary tastes for uninterrupted lines and minimalist decor. Hidden doors have no handles, no visible frames. They blend seamlessly into the surrounding surface, clean and uncluttered.
There are different ways to hide a door. Sugatsune caters for several solutions. Pocket doors and flush sliding systems that move panels sideways into recesses within the adjoining wall. Lateral-opening hinges bring a door forwards out of snug-fitting spots and across in front of a neighbouring surface.
All of these have their advantages. But they all involve a different kind of opening motion to conventional swing doors. That requires more planning and often extra installation work.
Hanging a swing door is the easiest installation option. But can you make that work for hidden doors?
A Simpler Way In
The answer is yes. You just need the right combination of components. As always, Sugatsune has you covered.
For a flexible way to add hidden doors to your interior, we recommend pairing our HES series concealed hinges with ML-ZN80 magnetic touch latches. The beauty of this combination is its simplicity. The concealed hinge provides the motion without any part being visible. The touch latch not only holds the door in place when closed, it allows the door to be opened without a handle. Push the door to release the magnetic catch, and the door swings open.
Beautiful in its simplicity, yes. But for the truly seamless alignment required to hide a door, and to guarantee reliable performance over time, you have to make the components do a lot of work. This precision-engineered pair are more than up to the task.
Look No Handles
Touch latches are an easy push-to-open solution. They are easy to install and have
little in the way of mechanical parts that can go wrong. But most magnetic touch latches are designed for lightweight cabinet doors and drawers.
The ML-ZN80 breaks the mould. With a metal body providing extra strength and durability, the ML-ZN80 is purpose-built for full-length doors. Its high push force( up to 5kgf / 49N) even makes it suitable for heavy duty doors weighing up to 125kg. For ease of installation, the magnet and strike plate have a 1.5 ° allowance each, meaning the magnet will still catch and hold even if there is a slight misalignment. To verify its durability, the hinge was tested to 100,000 cycles and passed successfully.
The ML-ZN80 means handles can vanish from full-length doors. And that’ s one part of the challenge whether you want to conceal a closet behind bedroom panelling, or hide a home office off a main living space. Visible handles give the game away.
What It All Hinges On
But that’ s just one half of the disappearing act. The other is all about the hinges.
The HES series is one of our most popular and successful components, a design which over the course of 30 years has managed to reinvent the very concept of concealed hinges. Rather than the long pivot arms of conventional concealed hinges for cabinets, HES hinges feature a compact, self-contained mechanism that folds neatly within the hinge body itself, remaining completely hidden from view when the door is closed.
With no exposed barrel or pivot arm, the HES was the first adjustable concealed hinge ever that didn’ t have to be‘ hidden’ inside a cabinet. It tucks away between the stile and jamb of interior doors, making it an obvious candidate for hidden entrances when you don’ t want any door components to be visible from either side.
Like the ML-ZN80, the HES series gives you options for concealing the most heavyweight doors- the HES3D-E190 is suitable for doors weighing up to 125kg, too. But heavy duty is not always the priority with a hidden door. For a walkin closet or concealed storage space, for example, you’ re more likely to want a slim, lightweight partition than a full door.
What the HES series gives you is flexibility and choice. While the HES3D-E190 gives you heavy-duty strength, the HES2S-150 works with slimline partitions as little as 35mm in thickness, with one half of the hinge surface-mounted so you don’ t have to mortise very thin surrounding panels. It’ s no stretch to say there is a HES hinge for every occasion, from the smallest cabinets to the largest interior doors.
Easy Conceal
Together, our ML-ZN80 magnetic touch latch and HES series concealed hinges offer a refreshingly straightforward approach to hidden doors. No wall pockets. No sliding rails. Just a good old fashioned swing door, engineered to blend seamlessly into the architecture around it.
What’ s not secret is that this elegant simplicity comes from Sugatsune. It’ s what we do.
To find out more, get in touch with the Sugatsune UK team.