An Elizabethan mansion's secrets for staying warm • Hacker News Board

Re: An Elizabethan mansion's secrets for staying warm

#41

Post by ctenb » Sat, Jan 17, 2026, 7:07 PM UTC

rapsey wrote: post #21

cwillu wrote: post #13

Brits will do anything except properly insulate their damn homes.

Brits, Dutch, Belgium, Northern Germany. They all have this incredibly outdated building style that they refuse to change. Bricks with no insulation. I live 1000km to the south of them and it is pretty standard for us to have tripple pane windows and thick insulation on our houses. But they for some reason prefer to live in cold houses during the winter and overheated houses during the summer. I have had multiple con…

This has not been true for at least a decade for dutch buildings: there are strict regulations requiring decent insulation for new buildings. Renovating and insulating old buildings is also encouraged, but not required by law.

Re: An Elizabethan mansion's secrets for staying warm

#42

Post by lazide » Sat, Jan 17, 2026, 7:11 PM UTC

pipes wrote: post #40

mmaunder wrote: post #2

Related to the Maunder Minimum, named after my namesakes: Astronomer Walter Maunder and his wife Annie Maunder. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maunder_Minimum And here's more info on The Little Ice Age: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Ice_Age Debatable as to whether solar activity was a contributor to The Little Ice Age.

What did you think about the point in the article suggesting millions of people dying on South America caused the earth to cool down due to reforestation absorbing more green house gas. I find this hard to believe.

There was a noticable (and well recorded) change in the climate for awhile when Ghenghis Khan went on his rampage. And he was a lot less effective at killing people than novel old world diseases.

It doesn’t seem completely implausible.

Re: An Elizabethan mansion's secrets for staying warm

#43

Post by asdff » Sat, Jan 17, 2026, 7:11 PM UTC

ynac wrote: post #10

When we lost power for 10 days a few winters back we attempted to use the fire place for heat. It was a fail. Post and beam house (large wide open floor plan) with a large transfer from 1st to 2nd floor, and apprently my lack of skill for optimizing heat over beauty in the fireplace, left us without much of a thermal bump. To this day I swear we were pulling heat out of the chimney faster than we were heating the hou…

I know someone who gets through the winter off their fireplace. Really old timber house with riverrock chimney. Their fireplace looks nothing like what you think of a fire place looking. You can’t see the fire, there is like this big iron door in front of it. They go through a huge pile of wood every winter, along with a couple electric heaters for rooms or office.

I assume most decorative fireplaces on the other hand are not built to heat the house.

Re: An Elizabethan mansion's secrets for staying warm

#44

Post by WalterBright » Sat, Jan 17, 2026, 7:16 PM UTC

crazygringo wrote: post #20

It's an interesting article on this one particular mansion, but the idea that "the same tricks for more efficient heating can be used in modern designs" seems pretty silly. We don't use fireplaces anymore (a major "trick" being to put them in the middle of the house rather than in the exterior walls), and while using large windows to capture sunlight and heat works great in the winter, it also leads to overheating in…

> Everyone I know who has built a house has thought very much about sun, season and temperature.

I've lived in houses that certainly did not take into account sun, season and temperature. I learned a lot from that experience. My current house is optimized for it. I've learned a few more things about it, and could do better.

> the idea that it has something to teach modern architects and builders is pure fantasy

Not my experience with architects and builders.

For example, how many houses have a cupola? They're common on older homes, but non-existent on modern ones. What the roof does is accelerate the wind moving over the roof, then the air vents in the cupola let the wind through, which sucks the heat out of the attic.

Another design element is eaves. Eaves shade the house in summer and don't shade it in winter (for more heat gain). Eaves also keep the sides of the house dry, which means your siding and paint and window frames last a lot longer. Mine are 1.5 feet. Most houses around here have tiny or even non-existent eaves.

The advent of air-conditioning is when architects stopped paying attention to the sun.

Re: An Elizabethan mansion's secrets for staying warm

#45

Post by RickJWagner » Sat, Jan 17, 2026, 7:16 PM UTC

Energy efficiency can seem counter intuitive.

A great example is the Clinton Presidential Library in Little Rock, Arkansas. At first glance, the building seems to be a giant rectangular box made of glass. Hardly ideal in the long, hot Arkansas summers.

It’s not the truth, though. In reality, the building is said to be highly efficient and was the first Federal building to be LEED certified. Amazing.

I guess we’ve learned a few things over the years.

https://www.clintonlibrary.gov/about-us/leed-certified-build...

Re: An Elizabethan mansion's secrets for staying warm

#46

Post by tpm » Sat, Jan 17, 2026, 7:37 PM UTC

rapsey wrote: post #21

cwillu wrote: post #13

Brits will do anything except properly insulate their damn homes.

Brits, Dutch, Belgium, Northern Germany. They all have this incredibly outdated building style that they refuse to change. Bricks with no insulation. I live 1000km to the south of them and it is pretty standard for us to have tripple pane windows and thick insulation on our houses. But they for some reason prefer to live in cold houses during the winter and overheated houses during the summer. I have had multiple con…

I think the buildings really are that old - you can't legally build new ones like that in the EU afaik. No idea about Britain, but yeah, I lived there in a flat like that, it was over 100 years old.

Re: An Elizabethan mansion's secrets for staying warm

#47

Post by tylerflick » Sat, Jan 17, 2026, 7:38 PM UTC

asdff wrote: post #43

ynac wrote: post #10

When we lost power for 10 days a few winters back we attempted to use the fire place for heat. It was a fail. Post and beam house (large wide open floor plan) with a large transfer from 1st to 2nd floor, and apprently my lack of skill for optimizing heat over beauty in the fireplace, left us without much of a thermal bump. To this day I swear we were pulling heat out of the chimney faster than we were heating the hou…

I know someone who gets through the winter off their fireplace. Really old timber house with riverrock chimney. Their fireplace looks nothing like what you think of a fire place looking. You can’t see the fire, there is like this big iron door in front of it. They go through a huge pile of wood every winter, along with a couple electric heaters for rooms or office. I assume most decorative fireplaces on the other han…

I grew up like this. We had special glass plates on the doors so you could see the fire (though this meant cleaning the glass every week).

Re: An Elizabethan mansion's secrets for staying warm

#48

Post by rapsey » Sat, Jan 17, 2026, 7:42 PM UTC

ctenb wrote: post #41

rapsey wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Brits, Dutch, Belgium, Northern Germany. They all have this incredibly outdated building style that they refuse to change. Bricks with no insulation. I live 1000km to the south of them and it is pretty standard for us to have tripple pane windows and thick insulation on our houses. But they for some reason prefer to live in cold houses during the winter and overheated houses during the summer. I have had multiple con…

This has not been true for at least a decade for dutch buildings: there are strict regulations requiring decent insulation for new buildings. Renovating and insulating old buildings is also encouraged, but not required by law.

Insulating old buildings and especially appartment buildings is very common over here. There the amount of uninsulated buildings is so much higher. Every time I am in that part of Europe I am appalled at the energy waste.

Re: An Elizabethan mansion's secrets for staying warm

#49

Post by interloxia » Sat, Jan 17, 2026, 7:48 PM UTC

crazygringo wrote: post #20

It's an interesting article on this one particular mansion, but the idea that "the same tricks for more efficient heating can be used in modern designs" seems pretty silly. We don't use fireplaces anymore (a major "trick" being to put them in the middle of the house rather than in the exterior walls), and while using large windows to capture sunlight and heat works great in the winter, it also leads to overheating in…

>a major "trick" being to put them in the middle of the house rather than in the exterior wall

I vised Löwenburg in Kassel which has bedrooms with similar curtains around the bed. Much later (1891) and with other heating technology of note. I was intrigued by the fireplace design in the room immediately behind the bed. The open fire is backed by a huge granite block built into the wall. The room had a close connection to servant stairways directly down to the exterior.

The guide describe the otherwise plain room as a dressing room. It looked like a convenient place to store a lot of firewood to stoke the fireplace attached to the bed behind it to me.

Re: An Elizabethan mansion's secrets for staying warm

#50

Post by rappatic » Sat, Jan 17, 2026, 7:49 PM UTC

> The house has lessons for how we can heat our homes more efficiently today

The problem in Europe isn't keeping warm in the winter but keeping cool in the summer. In part thanks to their near-total lack of AC in residential buildings, Europe has an extremely high heat-related death rate. 200k people per year die of heatstroke in Europe: this accounts for 36% of global heat-related deaths. This is despite Europe being only 9% of the world population, having a very cool climate in comparison to India and similar countries, and being among the richest regions in the world.