I used to look at these "frameless" showers and think how great they must be for cleaning. After experiencing 4 of them, including the one in the house I just bought, I don't understand how anyone ever thought this was a good idea. Yes, they look better. Yes, they are easy to clean.* What ruins all that is having to shower in a constant state of vigilance, watching for the dreaded stream of water snaking across the tiles on the other side of the glass.

"The Acclaim is a frameless glass shower, if the shower rose is pointed directly at the door, water leakage will occur." -Newline, designer of idiotic showers.

I can live with not being able to point the rose at the door (*although it was very convenient to be able to hose away the spray residue from the doors of my old shower while cleaning it). The problem is that aiming the showerhead at it is not the only potential scenario in which a stream of water might be directed toward a shower door. Human elbows, for example, have a tendency to concentrate and direct a stream of water doorward.

The sold-separately "acrylic seal packages" listed on Newline's site would seem to be a tacit admission that leaving OPEN GAPS around a shower door was perhaps not the smartest design choice. My shower has had these so-called seals retrofitted, but this band-aid solution, applied to a door system that was not designed with them in mind, does not eliminate leaking. In fact, it seems to exacerbate it under some circumstances. The bottom of the door has a thoroughly impotent sort of 'reverse flashing' that seems to encourage water out of the shower via capillary action.

I hated my 2010 framed shower when I had it. I had to completely remove the slider doors just to be able to clean sludge out of the roller tracks. But the whole time I was taking for granted the bliss of being able to shower without caring in which direction the water was going. I find myself wishing I still had that old shower.

Is there a sweet spot, a shower design that is both easy to clean and watertight?