Overview of the Project
Purchased Products
- Custom timber-look aluminium windows and doors (sliding doors, awning windows, swing doors and flyscreens)
- Kitchen cabinets, quartz benchtops and stainless steel sinks
- Wardrobe cabinets with sliding doors and internal fittings
- Sanitary ware: shower enclosures, vanities, basins, tapware and bathroom accessories
- Porcelain floor and wall tiles plus natural stone slabs
- Interior timber doors and door hardware
Project Background
The owner of a new-build villa project in Australia engaged FBM Sourcing as his china sourcing agent for the full building materials package: a custom-fabricated timber-look aluminium window and door system, kitchen and wardrobe cabinets, sanitary ware, porcelain tiles, natural stone and interior doors. The order was consolidated from multiple specialist factories and markets into two 40HQ containers, with every window and door unit inspected against the shop drawings before loading.
Villa windows and doors procurement was the heart of this project. The house design called for full-height sliding doors, awning windows, swing doors and matching flyscreens in a timber-grain finish — a package that had to be fabricated unit by unit from approved profiles, glazed, hardware-fitted and test-operated before it left China. Around that core package, the owner also wanted the categories that decide how a villa interior actually comes together: kitchen cabinets with quartz benchtops, sliding-door wardrobes, complete bathrooms and floor-to-wall tile and stone selections.
Buying this mix directly would have meant dealing with a window fabricator, cabinet factories, sanitary ware showrooms, tile merchants and a stone yard separately — each with its own specifications, lead time and packing standard. As a building material sourcing agent handling door and window sourcing from China alongside the rest of the list, FBM Sourcing ran the whole programme under one schedule and one point of responsibility, the same way we manage larger residential and commercial packages such as this luxury villa project in Australia.
Project Type
New-build villa, whole-house building materials and joinery procurement
Location
Australia
Project Highlights
Custom timber-look aluminium window and door package fabricated to shop drawings, piece-by-piece factory inspection, multi-category consolidation into 2×40HQ containers
Project Delivery Time
2015–2016
How It Works?
The project started with the villa’s architectural drawings and a window and door schedule. Every opening was itemised: sliding doors for the living areas, awning windows for bedrooms and bathrooms, swing doors, fixed panels and flyscreens, each with its size, opening direction, glass type and finish. Frosted glass was specified for bathroom windows and clear double glazing elsewhere, with a timber-grain finish on the aluminium profiles so the joinery would read as wood while keeping aluminium’s stability and low maintenance.
Beyond the window package, we worked through the interior categories room by room with the owner: kitchen cabinet layout and benchtop material, wardrobe configurations for each bedroom, sanitary ware for every bathroom, and tile and stone selections for floors and walls. The output of this stage was a single consolidated procurement list — item numbers, quantities, specifications and target budgets — that became the reference document for every factory quotation that followed.
Planning a similar project?
FBM Sourcing works with project owners, developers, main contractors and FF&E contractors on hotel, apartment, school, office and other commercial building projects. Send us your BOQ, drawings or product list — we’ll come back with a sourcing plan and budget estimate.
The owner flew to China for a guided sourcing trip, and we planned the itinerary around the procurement list. In the Foshan showrooms he compared kitchen cabinet door finishes and benchtop samples, tested stainless steel sink and tap combinations, and confirmed wardrobe cabinet layouts and fittings against his bedroom dimensions. In the sanitary ware district we shortlisted shower enclosures, wall-hung vanities, basins and bathroom accessories, and in the tile halls he selected glossy wall tiles, polished porcelain slabs and marble-look floor tiles — recording sample codes for every choice. See our guide to sanitary ware from China for how we structure these selections.
For the window and door package, our sourcing agent team shortlisted a specialist fabricator with proven export production in timber-look aluminium systems. The owner handled profile corner samples and finish boards at the factory before any order was placed, so the exact profile system, grain finish and hardware level were agreed on physical samples — not catalogue photos.
Orders were placed with each supplier against the documents agreed during the trip: the window fabricator worked from a confirmed cutting list generated from the villa’s shop drawings, while the cabinet, sanitary ware, tile and stone orders were placed against recorded sample codes and quantities. Each window and door unit was assigned an item number tied to its opening on the drawings, so that every frame, sash and flyscreen could be traced from fabrication through packing to installation on site.
Production was scheduled so that the long-lead window fabrication ran first, with cabinets, sanitary ware, tiles and stone timed to finish alongside it. That coordination is what allowed the whole villa package to consolidate into two 40HQ containers instead of a series of part-filled, part-paid shipments.
Quality control on a custom window and door package starts before assembly. We checked the extruded aluminium profiles as they arrived — cross-section geometry, wall thickness, thermal-break integrity and the consistency of the timber-grain finish against the approved sample. Cut lengths were verified against the cutting list piece by piece, with each member marked with its item number.
As units came together we inspected the details that decide how a window performs for the next twenty years: mitred corner joints pulled tight with no visible seam, machined connection holes aligned, friction stays and corner brackets correctly fitted, and sliding door rollers running smoothly on their tracks. Every assembled frame and sash was measured — width, height and diagonals — against the shop drawings, and each flyscreen was checked for mesh tension and fit. Glass was inspected unit by unit; one glazed panel was found damaged during inspection and was rejected and replaced before packing, which is exactly the kind of problem that must be caught in the factory rather than discovered on an Australian building site.
The cabinet, sanitary ware, tile and stone orders were inspected at their own factories before dispatch, checked against the recorded sample codes and quantities from the sourcing trip.
Packing matched the product. Window and door units were wrapped in protective film, packed into fitted cartons and strapped to steel A-frames and racks so that glass units travelled upright, the way glazing should. Sub-frames were packed with foam and corner protection in plywood-braced bundles, installation screws and brackets were boxed and labelled per unit, and the stone order was packed upright in braced plywood crates from the stone yard.
The consolidated order shipped in two 40HQ containers. Before loading we checked each container floor and walls, then loaded pallets and A-frames in a planned sequence — heavy stone and profile bundles first, glazed units secured upright, cartons and crates blocked so nothing could shift during the sea passage to Australia. Every packed unit was checked off against the loading list as it went in.
After shipment, FBM Sourcing remained the owner’s single point of contact for the whole package. Because every window and door carried its item number from the drawings, any question during installation could be resolved against the same documentation used in fabrication — and any claim, from a damaged panel to a missing bracket, was handled by our team directly with the responsible factory rather than by the client chasing suppliers from the other side of the world.
The villa received its complete building materials package — custom timber-look aluminium windows and doors, kitchen and wardrobe cabinets, full bathroom sets, tiles and stone — fabricated, inspected and consolidated in China and delivered in two 40HQ containers. Every glazed unit was test-operated and measured before loading, and the one defect found during inspection was replaced before shipment, not after arrival.
If you are planning a new-build villa or a multi-unit residential project and want one sourcing agent to take responsibility for windows, doors and the full interior package, send us your drawings, window schedule and product list — we will come back with a sourcing plan, budget estimate and delivery programme.
