This is the most predictable disappointment in a rural Simcoe County bathroom renovation. The glass goes in, it looks immaculate, and a year later it is permanently cloudy and nothing will shift it.
What is actually happening
Hard water carries dissolved minerals, mostly calcium and magnesium picked up from limestone ground. When a droplet sits on glass and evaporates, the water leaves and the minerals stay.
Glass looks smooth and is not. At a microscopic level it has enough texture for those deposits to bond into, and repeated cycles build a layer that has effectively become part of the surface. At that point it is etched rather than dirty, and cleaning products are working on the wrong problem.
Where this bites in this county
Springwater, including Midhurst, Minesing and Elmvale. Private wells through limestone ground. The hardest water Barrie Bathrooms works in.
Rural Alliston and New Tecumseth, and rural Essa around Angus. Wells on the concessions, same story.
Unserviced parts of Innisfil, west of the serviced area.
Municipal supply in Barrie and Orillia is moderately hard rather than severely hard. Glass there will still spot and still wants a squeegee, but it is not on the same timeline.
What to do about it
Treat the water. A softener is the actual fix, and it protects the fixtures, the valve cartridges and the water heater at the same time. Where a house has no treatment at all, this is a better use of part of a bathroom budget than a larger glass panel. Barrie Bathrooms says so even though it lowers the quote.
Specify coated glass. A factory-applied coating fills the surface so there is far less for minerals to bond into, and water sheets off rather than sitting. It is not permanent and it still wants a squeegee, but it moves the problem from months to years.
Choose polished porcelain over honed natural stone on the shower walls. Honed stone is porous and reactive and it will etch. Porcelain gives the same look and does not care.
Buy fixtures whose cartridges are stocked locally. On hard water a shower valve cartridge is a consumable, not a lifetime part.
Consider less glass. A half panel, or a curtain on a secondary bathroom, is a legitimate choice on an untreated well and it is not a downgrade. It is a maintenance decision.
The order to decide in
Water first, then surfaces, then glass. A frameless enclosure specified before anybody asked about the well is a specification made in the wrong order, and the homeowner finds out eighteen months later.
For the rest of what goes into the specification, see how a tiled shower is actually waterproofed.