# Showers with half a door... why? **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [July 24, 2024, 6:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/showers-with-half-a-door-why/1004733 "2024-07-24T06:51:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![JohnT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnt/32/15048_2.png) [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2024, 6:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/showers-with-half-a-door-why/1004733/1 "2024-07-24T06:51:05Z")
This was our shower in the Henri hotel in Vienna: [![Imgur](https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/53877863493_1a5ce8e55f_b.jpg "Shower door") ](https://www.flickr.com/photos/68782016@N08/53877863493/) This isn’t the first time I’ve seen this, but I wonder what the thinking is? Especially with the hand-held shower head, every time we took a shower it was inevitable that water would end up on the floor, needing to be mopped up. Anyway, if someone can answer as to why a shower with half a door makes any sense, that would be appreciated! ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2024, 6:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/showers-with-half-a-door-why/1004733/2 "2024-07-24T06:53:44Z")
I had one of those in a hotel I stayed in a few years ago and was equally baffled. My best WAG is it’s less cost-intensive than washing and replacing curtains and it requires fewer moving parts than a sliding door, and they figure that it’ll take housekeeping less time to just mop the floor since they presumably have to do that when they turn down the room anyway, but it seems like it’d really be a pain if you were staying for multiple days when these days they only send in housekeeping every third day or so. ---
**Author:** ![needscoffee](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/needscoffee/32/1076_2.png) [@needscoffee](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/needscoffee)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2024, 6:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/showers-with-half-a-door-why/1004733/3 "2024-07-24T06:54:22Z")
I’m more curious why there’s only a hand-held shower head. Eta: looks like there’s a mount for it on the wall which should be on the wall behind the glass. ---
**Author:** ![Smapti](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/smapti/32/17938_2.png) [@Smapti](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Smapti)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2024, 6:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/showers-with-half-a-door-why/1004733/4 "2024-07-24T06:56:24Z")
> [@needscoffee](#): > > I’m more curious why there’s only a hand-held shower head It looks like that metal dealy on the far wall is the mount for the shower head, though that just raises further questions since in that position it’d be spraying water directly at the opening. ---
**Author:** ![JohnT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnt/32/15048_2.png) [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2024, 7:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/showers-with-half-a-door-why/1004733/5 "2024-07-24T07:02:30Z")
When mounted, the shower head would spray the door. Unless you turned it. ---
**Author:** ![burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/burpo_the_wonder_mutt/32/365_2.png) [@burpo\_the\_wonder\_mutt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/burpo_the_wonder_mutt)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2024, 7:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/showers-with-half-a-door-why/1004733/6 "2024-07-24T07:42:04Z")
Plus, it doesn’t look like the hose is long enough. ---
**Author:** ![JohnT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johnt/32/15048_2.png) [@JohnT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JohnT)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2024, 7:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/showers-with-half-a-door-why/1004733/7 "2024-07-24T07:47:57Z")
You gotta STRETCH that mofo, but it is long enough. Barely. ---
**Author:** ![Beckdawrek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/beckdawrek/32/3647_2.png) [@Beckdawrek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beckdawrek)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2024, 8:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/showers-with-half-a-door-why/1004733/8 "2024-07-24T08:50:27Z")
My handheld is like that. It’s a retrofit. My mountie thing is on the wall. (I do have a whole set of doors though) I think the half door is a cost saving measure or a rock band had the room and broke the other(😳) It’s not like you can buy a half of a shower door that just fits right in. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2024, 12:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/showers-with-half-a-door-why/1004733/9 "2024-07-24T12:13:46Z")
These are real common in nicer hotels now. Most are better designed than the OP’s pic, where the opening is relatively smaller and the shower head, whether hand-held or wall-mounted, shoots parallel to the glass half-wall, not perpendicular to it. Keeping the tracks and hinged parts of a sliding or swinging door clean and not looking grody within a few months is a bitch. It’s less labor intensive to keep looking shiny new this way. Yes, water ends up on the floor, but not that much _if_ the enclosure is well-designed. Unlike the OP’s example. Some guests will mop up some of it using the bathmat just to reduce their own slip/fall risk and to avoid standing in a wet icky cold puddle. Others won’t, but water evaporates. Often the housekeepers don’t have any floor-mopping to do by the time they get into your room. OTOH, I do see examples of that design along with poor caulking on the floor and walls and tub/shower edge on the outside, where it’s obvious water is getting under the flooring and into the walls. That’s maybe gonna cost money at the next renovation time. As if the current management cares. A homeowner sure would. ---
**Author:** ![Llama\_Llogophile](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/49beb7/32.png) [@Llama\_Llogophile](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Llama_Llogophile)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2024, 2:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/showers-with-half-a-door-why/1004733/10 "2024-07-24T14:43:33Z")
I really hate this design. Whenever I’ve stayed in hotels with this setup I’ve always had a big puddle on the floor. Also, I don’t like the feeling of not being enclosed in the shower. Makes it harder to have the steam build up. ---
**Author:** ![Joey\_P](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/919ad9/32.png) [@Joey\_P](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joey_P)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2024, 2:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/showers-with-half-a-door-why/1004733/11 "2024-07-24T14:54:54Z")
That seems like a real PITA to clean the tub. I think I’d be slightly concerned they were just using a mop to clean it since the only other way I see is to physically get in the tub an squat down. You wouldn’t be able to reach it by kneeling on the floor. Also, no thanks to a mirror in the shower. Looking at the picture, I get the feeling that was originally designed as bath only. The odd placement of the shower wand holder. Not even just that it’s point at the glass, but you’d be standing so close to the sloped part of the tub I’d be worried about people slipping. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2024, 2:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/showers-with-half-a-door-why/1004733/12 "2024-07-24T14:56:53Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > Others won’t, but water evaporates. Often the housekeepers don’t have any floor-mopping to do by the time they get into your room. Water evaporates, but unless the bathroom floor is very well sealed, it also leaks. You really don’t want that puddle on the floor to be seeping through gaps in the caulking and dripping down into the unit on the floor below. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2024, 3:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/showers-with-half-a-door-why/1004733/13 "2024-07-24T15:29:06Z")
I fully agree I sure wouldn’t want that in _my_ house. Seems that hotels don’t much care. For whatever odd motivation. > [@Joey\_P](#): > > I think I’d be slightly concerned they were just using a mop to clean it since the only other way I see is to physically get in the tub an squat down. You wouldn’t be able to reach it by kneeling on the floor. How do you suppose housekeepers clean the tub/shower in the far more common arrangement of a full-width door rather than this half-width door? ---
**Author:** ![Mama\_Zappa](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/71e660/32.png) [@Mama\_Zappa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mama_Zappa)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2024, 3:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/showers-with-half-a-door-why/1004733/14 "2024-07-24T15:34:39Z")
> [@LSLGuy](#): > > These are real common in nicer hotels now. > … > Yes, water ends up on the floor, but not that much **_if_ the enclosure is well-designed.** (bolding mine) That’s a big IF. We stayed at a hotel on several occasions where all the rooms had large shower stalls with this sort of arrangement. It was nearly impossible to angle the shower head in such a way that you didn’t have a small lake on the floor as you were getting out. I’ve never seen the half door on something with a bathtub - that really seems like the worst of all possible worlds. Makes it super extra hard to get in and out of the tub, for example. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2024, 3:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/showers-with-half-a-door-why/1004733/15 "2024-07-24T15:55:40Z")
I saw this half door thing at a couple of hotels. At one there was no tub or even a ledge in front of the shower, the shower floor was the same tiling that extended across the bathroom. They provided a lot of extra towels which my wife and I used to make a sort of dam in front of the open part of the shower. I didn’t own that hotel, I was gone in a couple of days, someone else had to fix the leaks and clean the mold and mildew, so it didn’t bother me at all. ---
**Author:** ![LSLGuy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lslguy/32/5813_2.png) [@LSLGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LSLGuy)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2024, 4:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/showers-with-half-a-door-why/1004733/16 "2024-07-24T16:10:48Z")
The rooms with no lip between shower and floor are intended to be wheelchair compatible. They also work for people who can walk, but can barely lift their feet and probably use a walker to get around. ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2024, 4:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/showers-with-half-a-door-why/1004733/17 "2024-07-24T16:18:50Z")
I’ve got a half-door setup like that; the reason is: There’s no room for any more of a door than that - because the bathroom ceiling slopes down at the end furthest from the shower, because that slope is the inside of a pitched roof. It’s like this because the shower was not part of the original design of the bathroom; there was no shower when the bathroom was first fitted out - only a bath and going back further, there was no bathroom at all when the house was originally built, only an outside washroom across a paved yard, because the house was not originally even a house (it was a non-residential building). Retrofitting a shower in a space that was not originally concieved to contain a shower often means compromises must be made. If I have the spray set on its widest spread on the shower head, I have to angle the shower head toward the tiled wall a bit to prevent any of the individual streams from missing the edge of the bath, beyond the half door, and wetting the floor. It’s not ideal, but it’s pretty much all it can be. The half-door is hinged so that it can be swung out of the way to get in and out of the bath - it mates with the edge of the bath with a sort of wiper-blade type rubber seal. ---
**Author:** ![kayT](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kayt/32/3633_2.png) [@kayT](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kayT)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2024, 4:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/showers-with-half-a-door-why/1004733/18 "2024-07-24T16:23:26Z")
Something is apparently wrong with me. I don’t see any door at all, half or not. ---
**Author:** ![gnoitall](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/bb73d2/32.png) [@gnoitall](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gnoitall)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2024, 4:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/showers-with-half-a-door-why/1004733/19 "2024-07-24T16:33:59Z")
> [@kayT](#): > > I don’t see any door at all, half or not. There is no door. There’s a half-enclosure (fixed) and an opening where a door might be expected. The lack of the door is the point of this whole “what is it with” topic. ---
**Author:** ![Dewey\_Finn](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dewey_finn/32/4222_2.png) [@Dewey\_Finn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dewey_Finn)\ **Post date:** [July 24, 2024, 4:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/showers-with-half-a-door-why/1004733/20 "2024-07-24T16:36:39Z")
> [@Joey\_P](#): > > Also, no thanks to a mirror in the shower. On the other hand, I’d like a mirror in the shower to make shaving easier. I usually bring a hand-held plastic mirror with me. And I’ve stayed in hotels where it’s a “wet room” with nothing blocking the shower from the rest of the room. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/showers-with-half-a-door-why/1004733.md?page=2)