Lack of decent ventilation curse of our bathrooms

Does your bathroom need a tidy up? And no, I don't mean picking up the kids' clothes off the floor.

Is the wallpaper looking a little tired and lifting at the edges or do you feel the need for a splash of colour to give the bathroom a lift. Now might be a good time to set aside some time and give that tired space a new lease of life before the winter sets in again, though hopefully our glorious summer is going to continue for some time yet.

One of the biggest problems we have in many of our homes is lack of ventilation and good insulation, creating damp homes or rooms in our homes that become damp.

Unfortunately rooms on the south side of the house and often rooms that create steam tend to have this problem, namely our bathrooms and laundries. Although, not so much laundries unless driers are not vented to the outside.

Mould can be a continuing problem in many bathrooms and unfortunately it doesn't go away by covering it up with paint or rolling that wallpaper down the wall. Think again, you need to get to the root of the problem and that could simply be ventilation.

Some of us are old enough to remember the days when our homes breathed.

As a newly married couple, I remember the excitement of our first home. It was a very run-down 1910 villa and we would sit in our lounge on windy evenings and watch as the wallpaper moved in and out on the walls.

Those were the days when wallpaper was glued to scrim and fixed to sarking. To the extreme, when the southerly wind blew, all the kitchen cupboard doors would pop open, it made for a very draughty kitchen but we had plenty of ventilation.

Not that I would want to go back to living in a very draughty house.

Houses were built to breathe. The cladding, linings and windows all allowed our homes to breathe and to a certain extent for air to flow. The only insulation we had were the clothes we put on.

Time and technology have definitely allowed us to move on from there, thank goodness!

Along with busy lifestyles and changing times our homes have changed as well.

New builds and renovations have allowed homes to become more streamlined, new products and systems replacing the old, creating healthier homes. But we still have a long way to go as many of our older homes are still damp.

This is often created by the house being shut up all day because of work and school commitments.

The bathroom becomes a hive of activity in the morning with everyone showering and getting ready to go their separate ways.

The condensation builds up, you are often too busy or late for work to deal with the situation at the time, the house is then shut up all day.

Where does that condensation go and what does it grow? Lack of, or poor ventilation, in the bathroom is one of the major factors causing mould to form.

Open a window you might say, now that would be too easy.

But if you had a bathroom like I had, there may not be a window to open.

We had an old noisy extractor fan that didn't extract at all.

On the weekend my two teenagers would escape to the bathroom (probably from me) for hours of preening, one would soak in the bath with a stash of food and a book, the other would try to drain the infinity hot water system.

The walls and ceiling were soon dripping with moisture and as the extractor fan didn't work and we had no opening window there was nowhere for the moisture to go.

If you're in the same situation and you have no windows that open, invest in a good extractor and perhaps look at a heater for the room.

There are a variety of them on the market, some combining extractors, heaters and lights and are ceiling mounted.

Make sure it has the capacity to do the job efficiently and that it is ducted to the outside by the shortest route.

The short distance will make the extraction more efficient.

You may not need a complete unit but just require a wall mounted heater to work in conjunction with your existing extractor.

The heater will warm the air and you will have less condensation to deal with.

If budget is an issue, you can simply wipe the walls down after the bathroom has been used and let the air flow through to help dry the room. Above all, if you have a window, open it, this is by far the cheapest option but won't necessarily solve the problem completely.

And if you have a serious mould problem you need to remove it.

Unfortunately if it has had time to grow and is really bad it will often ruin the wall linings and is best removed and reline the room.

Mould tends to grow not only on the surface but through whatever it is growing on and spores can cause serious health problems if not taken care of properly.

Next week I'll have to write about a happier topic and not doom and gloom of some of the houses we live in.

If you have any questions about issues discussed or product supply give me a call on 0276023298 or drop me a line on terry@terrylobb.com www.terrylobb.com (website under construction)