Tips and tricks for a safe and affordable mirror wall for your home gym

With health and fitness trends on the rise, so are our requests for home gym mirrored walls. If you are considering adding a gym to your home, here are a few of recommendations on how to make your mirror wall safe and affordable.

We recommend that mirrored walls are made with ¼” mirror and installed with a J-mold track on the bottom and glued to the wall with mirror mastic (adhesive made specifically for mirrors). If you are installing the mirrors yourself, it is very important that you use mirror mastic. Silicone, caulking, or liquid nails will eat through the silvering on the back of the mirror and your investment will be ruined.

While some people would prefer to not permanently glue the mirror to the wall, and may prefer using removable clips, we recommend against this for safety reasons. Mirrors in gyms (especially commercial gyms) are much safer if they are glued to the wall. Imagine this scenario: If a heavy weight hits an unglued mirror, the mirror could crack and fall to the ground in large jagged pieces, potentially seriously harming someone in the process. If a heavy mirror hits a mirror that is glued securely to the wall, the mirror may still crack, but the mirror mastic will hold the broken pieces of mirror to the wall, preventing serious injury to those who may be in the area.

While many customers would prefer the largest mirror possible, without splitting the mirror into multiple sections, we recommend against this for a couple different reasons. First, the wall the mirror is being mounted on may not be perfectly flat and when we glue the mirror to the wall the mirror will want to follow the shape of the wall. If the wall is bowed, the larger mirrors can end up with a distorted reflection (think a funny mirror at a carnival). By splitting the mirrored wall into smaller sections, we are able to make adjustments to each piece of mirror, which will result in the truest reflections. Larger mirrors are also more difficult and dangerous to handle and will require more man power, which means we would charge more for the labor to install them. Smaller mirrors are more manageable to handle therefore we are able to keep our labor costs down.

Another way to reduce the cost of a home gym mirrored wall would be to forego a nice polished edge and opt for a seamed edge instead. A mirror with a polished edge must be ordered out and suppliers charge by the inch for polishing. A seamed edge is were we sand the edges of the mirror so the edges are not sharp to the touch, but they do not have a high glass edge. A seamed edge can be done at our shop and we do not charge extra for this service. Commercial gyms may want to spend the extra money for a more finished product, but if you are looking to cut costs on your home gym mirrors, this may be a good option for you.

You can also reduce the cost of any mirror by reducing the height of the mirror. Unless the mirror is for a ballet barre studio or another application where you want to be able to see your feet, we suggest raising the mirror up off the ground. This also helps reduce the change that a weight could roll into the mirror and crack it. Another reason to raise the mirror up a few inches would be to possibly avoid having to cut a hole in the mirror to accommodate an electrical outlet. You can estimate that the additional cost for us to put an outlet cutout in a mirror would be an additional $150-200 per outlet.

If you are a DIYer, you can always purchase the materials from us and install the mirror yourself. Just make sure you have a safe way to transport the mirrors, as they do not come wrapped in protective wrapping. We also sell all of the J-mold and mirror mastic that you will need for the installation.

We hope this information was useful and informative. If you are looking to get a quote on a mirror wall for your home, take some approximate measurements and call or contact us through our website for a free phone or email quote.