What options against excessive heat in south-facing kitchen? Awnings window films blinds...

[ParentOfOne]

We have a south-facing kitchen which can easily get 12-14C warmer than outside. It's basically a greenhouse. Great in the winter, awful in spring and summer.

For those who have been in similar situations, how have you handled it? Other than installing air conditioning.

We are looking at:

• window films which supposedly reduce heat absorption
• retractable external awnings or just a parasol, to put in the garden and give some shade to the kitchen French doors
• blinds and shutters

We already have fans and keep the kitchen as ventilated as possible, but that doesn't do much

Any thoughts / suggestions / recommendations?

We went for an awning and external velux blinds. Worked really well and looked nice too. Any kind of internal blind is useless and blocks the view.

Expensive but well worth it.

What about a brise soleil? I'll see if I can find a couple of pictures.

This sort of thing. It's permanently mounted and the slats are angled so that when the sun is low in the sky (winter) you get full sun but when the sun is high in the sky it's blocked by the slats.

We have been round and round this. Ultimately I think we'd go for a retractable awning. Having gone through all the options of blinds, shutters, tinted glass, etc, and none seeming right, we've found a couple of pairs of £7 IKEA sheer curtains have been a really good solution! When pulled, they look good, keep the room light and airy but really contain the direct sunlight and the heat so we can sit at the table and eat!

The problems with air conditioning, other than the environment, are 1) the massive ugly box you have to have somewhere on the outside of your house and 2) you have to keep the doors shut for it to work which is difficult especially if you have small kids or pets.

It’s an old thread, I know but in view of the horrific heat last summer…..my living room is south west facing. Sun from 1pm ish until sunset. I have an awning but it seems we are getting more windy days which means the awning has to be retracted. Anything over 20 mph, which is frequent and awning has to be taken in. I agree with others that outside shutters by far the best solution but my house isn’t designed for that so am considering a pergola. Anyone experienced?

We were looking at an awning at the time of this thread, but have been put off with the windy days and our cantilever parasol!

So we're now also considering a pergola. Looking at this kind of thing:

www.harbourlifestyle.co.uk/products/pergostet-3m-x-4m-pergola-3-sides-led-white

Just need to persuade DH that he could put it up!

I use blinds/curtains and I think that might be your cheapest option OP, especially if you can self install

We've got this issue and I'm thinking either a sail, a brise soleil or a pergola. It definitely needs to be that you keep the heat away from the house in the first place, I think, so internal blinds aren't so good.

Rats will climb your wall to get to food not sure why they would want to otherwise.....pergolas are not strong enough to walk/climb on

Wallet protection from the electrical bill not to mention Environmental protection.

Shut your windows before it gets hotter outside than in....heat is drawn to colder air. Anything to shade the walls and windows outside....awnings, pagodas, sails.

After posting on this thread last year I got a shade sail from ikea and put it up to shade my large south facing living room window. It hasn't solved the heat, but it has had a massive impact during last summer.

Yes I do absolutely everything to keep heat outside. Windows on sunny sides all closed asap. Curtains closed and awning out. But as I said before awning has to come in when it’s windy. So then nothing to stop sun coming in. Windows also are Low E. in my case means heat can come in but gets trapped inside! The exact opposite of what I need! Other than external shutters which are not easy to fit on my walls or lack of (!) a pergola seems to be the only solution.

What exactly is a shade sail?

I had a flat like this with no option for external awning but I understand that's the best

I literally had to cover the windows in thick card - behind the heat proof curtains. And I had an air con unit. Without it, the fridge and freezer wouldn't work. Manual states clearly that they won't work if the surrounding temp goes over 35c.

as you can have external awnings, you don't need thick card!

I mean cardboard btw, not like stationery thickness.

Oh and the bill from the portable A/C wasn't high.

I've just had solar control glass put in my living room (which basically has one wall which is conservatory windows) and semi-blackout blinds with a honeycomb construction. I haven't had a summer yet with these in yet but early signs are really positive.

I also have a portable AC unit which helped to keep things just about manageable before this year (ie under 40 degrees inside in hot weather).

Curtains and blinds are almost useless if they are INSIDE the property; you want stuff OUTSIDE the property to stop the sun hitting your windows and walls and therefore heating the house.

Last year we put awnings above the kitchen - that really helps, when it's not too windy. There remain too south-facing bedrooms which get very,, very hot.

We looked into external wall insulation but ultimately decided against it: the way the windows are located, it would have clashed with the windows (not enough room), so we would have also had to replace windows, and it would have been too expensive.

We looked into MicroLouvres https://www.smartlouvre.com/ - a kind of metal mesh to apply to the outside of the windows to limit solar gain. I didn't mind them, but my partner hated them, found them too ugly and we ultimately decided against it. They are uglier when you see them in person compared to the website, but they also seemed very effective.

I think we'll buy one portable air conditioning unit (nowish, before any hint of heatwave, as they sell out quickly) and see how this summer goes. If it is unbearable, we might consider changing the windows from the kind which opens outwards to the guillotine (sliding up and down), so we can add external blinds or shutters. But the #@@##!!! at my local council insist that external shutters require planning permission even if not visible from the road (that's what they told a friend in the area).

PS By the way, one of the reasons I hate newbuilds (houses but especially flats) is they seem to be built as if climate change were not real: floor to ceiling south-facing glass facades, sometimes without north-facing windows at all ((so no cross ventilation). And good luck trying to install external shutters or aircon in a modern flat, they'll never let you.

The point is not how often we reach 30C, it is that, even with 23C outside, it can be more than 30 inside - and this can happen for a good few months every year.

I had that problem, though I will say the insulation is extraordinary and the heating bill is negligible.

I looked at this a lot because it was boiling from April till end of October. The problem seems to be all insulation targets and no thought for cooling. I don't know how far back the problem goes because obviously in the 70s they were worried about a new ice age.

installing an air cooling system seems a good answer. I know of one development where the vents can give hot air or cold air, like an all in one system. Seems very sensible.

I didn't realise councils want planning for that. It's mad - they don't care about loss of privacy anymore but they want to know if you're installing external shutters?! Crazy.

@EmmaEmerald English building regulations should really take inspiration from the PassivHaus standard: https://www.passivhaustrust.org.uk/what_is_passivhaus.php which builds exceptionally well insulated houses - insulated against both cold and heat. An architect friend tells me there is a proposal (in England) to limit the surface of glass in south-facing rooms for this very point, but so far it's only a proposal.

As for planning permission: yes, the council told someone I know who lives nearby that both external wall insulation and external shutters require planning permission. TBH I don't know if they are even right, there are many situations where the council just gets it wrong, but that's what they said.

The Financial Times recently published a story on how difficult it is to retrofit older homes to make them more energy efficient: councils are understaffed, rules are opaque, it's a real mess https://www.ft.com/content/4eed17fa-0eec-4b5b-b35d-7da017c2bef2

Interesting to hear they plan for this in futureRe the windows, the mgmt company company advised me not to spend too much on blinds - I asked their advice, it wasn't apropos nothing - as they knew from previous residents that it didn't help much. They said the wall insulation was designed to grab heat and keep it.

I only bought the A/C unit in 2016 when i started working at home. I also mistakenly believed a lot of myths about it, especially the idea that you have to have a perfect sealed vent for it to work.

my mum has rejected all ideas of getting her house warmer because she's convinced it will be money badly spent, she might well be right!