Hi all. New to the forum and wasn't quite sure this was the most appropriate place to post but thought I'd give it a go.
We have a flat with a large balcony. The balcony is effectively shared with the flat next door and is separated by this metal divider with metal beams and a sort of metal sheet with holes (see picture). We put a trellis with fake ivi to increase visual privacy (otherwise neighbours would see straight into our living room). However this (naturally) provided no soundproofing, which means that if we have the living room window open and the neighbours are in the balcony you can hear them as if they were in our flat. Worse still is the fact that the current neighbours are chain-smokers who love to sit in their balcony and smoke (no rules against it in the property manuals/instructions unfortunately) and stink up our flat if we open our windows.
We've been thinking about ways of improving the division between the two balconies without falling foul of the rules for the property which doesn't allow modifications to the balcony.
I've been thinking about getting some transparent glass or perspex cut to shape and fix it inside the metal frame (right on top of the metal sheet with holes) and over of the metal beams (gaps on the left of the picture) to create a quasi-hermetic seal between the two (I'm of course aware of the large gap above the divider!). However, I thought I'd do a bit of "crowdsourcing" to see of anyone has better ideas. Mindful that there are no perfect solutions, but just looking for some "material" improvement.
Should also flag that the balcony is south facing and it gets really hot during the summer (saw a thermometer outside read almost 50C this year, under direct sunlight of course) so I do wonder if materials like perspex risk melting.
Thanks in advance!
PS: not quite sure why the picture is not straight...
