Finding your door: in Lyon the street address is rarely enough
In Vieux Lyon and on the Pentes de la Croix-Rousse, one building often opens onto two streets linked by a traboule, a covered passage cutting straight through the block and usually closed by a keypad. On the phone, give the entrance that actually works, the code if you know it, and the name on the intercom.
A galleried courtyard makes the description harder still. On the same level, four or five doors look alike, none carries a number, and the gallery sometimes serves two separate staircases. Say which flight, which side of the courtyard, and give a landmark visible from the walkway: a painted door, a meter box, a window over the light well.
Rue du Bœuf is pedestrianised, the montée du Gourguillon is a steep cobbled climb, and the carriage doors of the Presqu'île are shut in the evening. Tools regularly finish the journey on foot from the nearest place a van can stop, so mentioning that at the first call is part of preparing the job.
Latched or deadlocked: Lyon's building stock changes the answer
On the latch alone, everything turns on the shape of the leaf. Under the four-metre ceilings of the 4th a silk-weaver's door is tall and heavy to match; decades on it has warped, bearing at the top while it gapes at the bottom, and the clearance moves from one part of the rebate to the next. A shim does not find the run it would have on a standard leaf.
A deadlocked door is another matter. In the newer buildings at Confluence, in Gerland or on the renovated Duchère estate, a shrouded multipoint throws its bolts over the full height of the leaf and the cylinder hides behind a guard. No method is promised from the pavement: the door is looked at, what it demands is said out loud, and the itemised quote is handed over before a tool touches the lock.
Before any door is opened you have to show that you live behind it. A rent receipt does the job, so does an energy bill or a home insurance schedule — and if all of it sits on the other side of the door, just say so. In the nineteenth-century buildings of the 6th a resident caretaker is often still in post and can vouch for you; elsewhere a neighbour on the landing serves the same purpose.
How does this service work?
Techniques, typical situations, standards and things to watch out for: it is all on our door opening page. This page focuses on what the service involves in Lyon.