damp under stairs

[weaselwithin]

we hang our coats under the stairs but realised today that all the walls are extremely cold, causing some mold on some scarves that were hanging!

is there anything I can do?

is there some special paper I can put on the walls under the clothes hanger to protect my coats?!

thanks!

You need to find out why it's damp. Is there a leaking pip somewhere? No ventilation?

very old cottage with extremely thick walls, so it's just general old house damp!

it's not wet but very cold and smells funny. we're not really bothered about solving the issue because I think that's just what you get in very old houses and it's just a storage space mainly, but need to do something to protect the coats!

You can buy rolls of special fire retardant polystyrene from large B&Q's. I put it on the walls of a cupboard built into the eaves of a rental house. Buy the special glue that goes with it as it is worth it.

Any item that goes next to a cold outside wall creates condensation as you need air flow. This is different from damp. Damp goes up a wall a metre high. If you get damp spores upstairs against outside cold walls, then it is condensation. You get condensation if you are drying washing indoors without much ventilation. The moisture has got to go somewhere.

great thanks!

ah yes, the wall with the coats on is an outside wall. no heat or ventilation in the cupboard at all but we do generally keep the door open whilst we're at work

You can buy pots with desiccant silica gel in which are good for eliminating mildew in cupboards.