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I've been watching some renovations in the UK, which I find really interesting, but I forgot that most homes are built out of brick and "tearing them down to th
by seanmcdirmid 2y ago
I've been watching some renovations in the UK, which I find really interesting, but I forgot that most homes are built out of brick and "tearing them down to the studs" really isn't possible. I guess the same is true with concrete (rather than brick) homes in Southern China (or why my mother-in law doesn't have heat in the winter and why it is so bloody cold to visit). They deal with that though by using things like Kotatsus, which I don't think westerners would find very appealing.
- pjc50 2y agoThe only viable solution for those is effectively building an inner insulated shell in each room, which does work but loses interior space. My grandmother lived most of her life in a poorly insulated brick terraced house with no central heating - every day she'd get up and light a coal fire in the grate. A lifestyle that belonged more to the 1890s than the 1990s.
- seanmcdirmid 2y agoSouthern China has no central heating either. Old Chinese farm houses in the north still have coal, I stayed at an urban house in Tianjin in 1999 that still used coal honeycombs for heating. The kotatsu was invented in Japan to provide a space to heat individuals, so it’s kind of like that. You’ll still find it in use today.