AIBU to think people following home trends such as glass lanterns regret this now

Whether it’s home or clothing, billions of pounds are spent in ensuring people do follow fashions. Naive of you to think you aren’t impacted by it in some way.

A lantern is a skylight in a sort of pyramid shape rather than flat glass.

I’ll hold my hand up and admit to some level of regret. S facing, we did an extension with lots of glass. We have an awning which helps enormously but it’s still too hot in the kitchen when it’s 30 plus - didn’t foresee that temperature becoming a regular thing!

I don’t regret putting in the glass doors and skylights but with hindsight would have made the skylights smaller and also not had a “glass box” windowseat (should have put solid roof on it instead).

During our winters though, the glass is wonderful, I love having so much sun streaming in the house, and the warming effect means we rarely need the heating on. So I can’t really regret it that much.

I feel really thick asking this but what is a ‘lantern’ in this context please?

It seems like the UK is turning into Australia. It’s fine to build houses completely unsuited to the weather, just put in the air con more (and contribute more to climate change in most cases unless you have solar)
These need to have blinds on and a design so they can be opened at night to let the hot air out. All this stuff is fine if you design it properly

Not to mention the bird poo.

Interesting thread. We have a conservatory which is too cold in the winter and an oven in the summer and were hoping to convert it into an extension with a roof/skylights/insulation and bi-folds....is this not going to make it a more useable space?!

All of this, plus they must be a bugger to keep smear free.

We’ve got a pitched glazed roof kitchen extension. We are saving up for air con and blinds (I have made temporary ones)! Once they’re in place or it’s not above 27 ish outside I will be happy again. Our architect and builder assured us heat wouldn’t be an issue… I do love watching the sky and it lets loads of light into what would otherwise be a very dark room.

Ours is a standard 3 bed semi - downstairs just the kitchen, that now has space for a table, living room, downstairs loo and tiny entrance bit. Just makes our house a bit more useable for a small family. Minus the heat!

Solidarity, sister. I loathe all these cavernous box-shaped kitchen extensions with their bloody islands surrounded by high stools which do my back in, and their dazzling overhead windows which give me migraine, and their great walls of glass which bifold back to let in insects and poor lost birds and rainstorms and local foxes and next door's barbecue smoke and rap music, and which take the light away from what used to be exactly the sort of nicely proportioned dining room with French doors which I can never find on Rightmove now because of all these bloody extensions.
Just saying.

My unmodernised, Victorian house has an original skylight in the attic room! 😂

We have bifolds in our not exciting 80s build house. South facing. Yep hot at the moment but I still love opening up the living room into the garden, and most of the year it's fine. I would like aircon but we will likely downsize before we get really old, and until then a huge ceiling fan and portable aircon does the job.

It's put me off houses to buy if they have those lanterns and large glass doors. I think generally you have to be careful with glass as it can be cold in winter and hot in summer.

I once went to a children's birthday party where everyone cooked in the lantern/glass door kitchen. Another 2 parties with family /friends we froze our asses off in the glass roofed rooms.

A friend has lovely bifolds but maybe it's the skylight that makes it hot.

We have skylight in our attic stairs and it's fine. But we live in Manchester so it's not hot.

My neighbours had a glass box extension put on their house (1970s bungalow) a few years ago. It's hot as Hades. They have a beach parasol up in their dining conservatory and sit under it on deck chairs reading the Daily Mail.

Totally agree that mid-century modern is a recognised movement.
There's a school of thought that if you want a mid-century modern house then buy one. There are millions about. Don't buy a Victorian house and fuck it over with all kinds of mid-century modern or just plain modern stuff. You see a lot of it on Rightmove etc. Someone buys the most amazing Victorian villa, then two years later it's back on the market with black plastic windows and a 'clean asthetic' that makes it look like Lego.

I'm very happy with our bifold doors but we face N-NW so don't get too much direct sunlight on them. The other side of the house is hotter as it has sun all day.

Nope, lantern fine here (1910 house), tbh I’d say it’s been life enhancing. Brings a ton more light in and heat at the mo is fine cos it’s a north north east facing garden. And that’s huge. Blinds on the french doors for winter and underfloor heating. It’s transformed our use of the downstairs!

Lots of glass here as well. Our house was carefully designed and built so the heat isn't an issue. We wouldn't trade our beautiful views for a conventional box for anything.

I’ve got lots of glass, and air con! No regrets

We downsized to a park home with a glass porch and at the moment it's hotter than hell. I can dry washing in hours on an airer but cannot walk on the floor barefoot, we do have two rugs down. We tried putting a blind on one window last year as we have a Small table and chairs in there which we use for 2 months in spring and 2 months in autumn but the extra fancy glue dh used for the hooks kept melting so we gave up.

No. Im still happy, no regrets
LOL. Nominative Determinism in action

😆

I don’t know anyone who lives in an unmodernised Victorian house, @PixellatedPixie , but I do know plenty of people who live in Victorian town cottages with really weirdly huge extensions tacked onto the back, covered in swathes of sweltering glass. I mean, we’re not talking the occasional cooling skylight in your personal Roman villa here, are we?

Mines a bit more than a lantern 😂

Yes its bloody hot!

It is also glorious to live in this house. Just means we will install aircon this winter. Which is good because it’s forced our hand to just get on with it.

Currently using a portable unit and we are sitting having dinner under this light at 27c

Also getting external film installed to reduce the uv and heat gain.

So no I am not sad about my glazing 😂 in fact I think every single day how lucky I am and have lived here half a decade now. Thats a lot of joy

No, not at all. I have a kitchen with skylights and French windows overlooking an east-facing water meadow. I can sit and watch the Dawn all year round. The kitchen is warm from the sun, nine months of the year, it seldom needs heating.

If it gets too warm I open the doors. By noon the sun has moved off the back of the house and I can create an airy through draft. It's lovely. 🙂

Really? You can’t move for renovation blogs, Instagram posts, and magazines. It’s a big thing. If you’re talking about using reclaimed materials that’s completely different.

Is it something peculiarly English or the Welsh not do this too? There’s a lot of renovation going on in Wales so perhaps they’re not living in the unmodernised houses that you’re thinking of. But I have absolutely never come across an unmodernised Victorian house. Perhaps I’m too sophisticatedly urban.

We built our conservatory last year so this is the first summer we've had it. Yes it's too hot to use, but the days that have been closer to 25 have been fine in there.
We do need to sort out a better curtain or blind system as currently have a sail for the roof and I have hung up some side muslin curtains to block the sun. Our garden is n/nw facing so the whole side is west facing and in full sun all day.
Also, once some more garden landscaping has been done and I can plant out the trees and shrubs I have in pots, they will help shade it and help keep the temperature down a bit.
However, once this summer passes it will be usable again, so the short term pain is worth it imo.
It has highlighted the need for the doors between the kitchen and it though, if only to keep out all the flies whilst I'm cooking dinner that we've had this year. That has been awful.