Old House Eco Handbook: A Practical Guide to Retrofitting for Energy Efficiency and Sustainability

How can we make old houses energy efficient without devaluing future sustainability? And how can we do so without compromising their appeal and character?

This practical and essential guide to retrofitting for energy efficiency seeks to provide answers to this and other questions homeowners of old houses are asking. Whether your house is medieval and timber-framed or a Georgian, Victorian or Edwardian terrace, it can be made more energy efficient and sustainable. This practical, comprehensive and fully illustrated handbook will show you how. 

Revised and updated throughout, and with a foreword by Kevin McCloud, Old House Eco Handbook includes chapters on the building envelope; roofs and ceilings; windows and doors; walls; floors; paints; energy, air and water; plus a brand new chapter on retrofit materials.

In association with The Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings, this is a must have for owners of old houses looking to make their homes more energy efficient and sustainable.

Roger Hunt, co-author (with Marianne Suhr) of Old House Handbook, is an award-winning writer and blogger with a particular interest in sustainable and vernacular architecture and the materials and techniques used in construction. He is the author of Rural Britain: Then and Now, a celebration of the British countryside, Villages of England and Hidden Depths, an archaeological exploration of Surrey’s past. Roger was named Sustainable Property Journalist of the Year at the LSL Property Press Awards in both 2013 and 2014. He lectures on building-related issues, is a judge of annual awards for new housing and serves on the editorial board of the SPAB magazine. His latest renovation project is a 1900 house on Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts, USA.

Marianne Suhr is a Chartered Building Surveyor, writer and broadcaster specialising in the repair and retrofit of historic buildings. After a scholarship with the SPAB, she worked for seven years in architectural practice, then full-time on hands-on repair projects of her own including four very different old houses. She has run over 40 homeowners’ courses and numerous ‘limedays’ for the SPAB. She is co-author (with Roger Hunt) of Old House Handbook and Old House Eco Handbook, and has written and lectured extensively. Marianne was co-presenter of three series of BBC2’s ‘Restoration’. Marianne runs The Old House Consultancy in Oxfordshire, advising homeowners on repair, alteration and retrofit.