One Bordeaux wall in two is not what it looks like
In an échoppe or an older building, the façade walls and cross walls are stone: generous thickness, considerable mass, first-rate anchorage for a built-in safe. The trap lies elsewhere. Many large flats in the centre have been subdivided over the decades, and the partitions created at the time are lightweight — plaster, hollow brick, stud framing — sometimes impossible to tell apart under the render. Checking beforehand avoids cutting a recess into a wall that will never take the load expected of it.
The floor counts as much as the wall. In older buildings, the upper storeys rest on timber joists: a heavy safe is installed there taking account of the span, the direction of the joists and how close a load-bearing wall is. On the ground floor of an échoppe, by contrast, you are working on a slab and the constraint disappears. That leaves getting it there, because an old staircase turns tightly and a safe does not come apart: this point is settled before ordering, not on the day of installation.
Co-ownership, damp, discretion: three local questions
First point, legal. In a co-owned building, load-bearing walls form part of the shared structure: setting a safe into a stone cross wall therefore requires the agreement of the co-owned building, and not simply a decision by the owner of the flat. The request goes through the syndic and may need to be put to a general meeting. When that route is too slow or too uncertain, a free-standing safe bolted to the floor with fixings suited to the substrate offers a solution that involves only your own home.
Second point, damp. The cellars of buildings near the quays, the vaulted basements of the centre and the former chais kept at the back of échoppes are cool and damp: they suit paper, photographs and digital media badly. Third point, discretion. For a business in the city centre, where the stockroom is often upstairs and space is tight, the location has to stay out of sight of customers and be known only to the staff authorised to use it.
How does this service work?
Techniques, typical situations, standards and things to watch out for: it is all on our safes page. This page focuses on what the service involves in Bordeaux.