Nope..

They keep warm by burning the corpses of the poor and needy on their roaring hearth’s while braying loudly on and on about the scrounging classes..

we bought a house with a conservatory, it was crap, seperated by old aluminium sliding door, ugh. for 2 years we used it as a storage room for bikes 🙂 then we decided to make it part of the living room. We took out the alu doors and put oak floor down in the liounge and out to the conservatory so it felt like the same room, we put in two radiators and some ceiling blinds, we then fitted oak dividing doors that are double glazed. We thought we’d have them to seperate the rooms so i can use the conservatory as an office, but also to close off the cold if needed. The radiators are big jobbies specified for a cold conservatory.

The result works well and we often dont close the doors between the rooms, we have thick curtains there too. The next thing I need to sort is to put some insulation on the underside of the doors, its not essential and I’m only doing it cos I think it should be an air tight divider.

Same as most things-pay a bit more money for a glass roof & top quality glazing & it is viable. The heat reflecting roof means we don’t need roof blinds but we have window blinds for privacy & “cosiness” when dark. We use ours most of the year & spend most of our summer evenings & weekend days in it due to the lovely feeling of light & space you get. We also use it as a dining area. During really cold spells it probably isn’t worth heating. It has never had any internal condensation. 5×3 is a good size and we have a patio door between it & the house.

My parents had one built a couple of years ago. 6×4. Heat reflective glass, the works.

Total waste of money, they hardly use it, well my mum has never used it as she doesn’t like the smell of the custom made wicker seating that cost a fortune 🙄

The flooring (big floor tiles) gets condensation on it under the furniture.

It’s too cold in the winter, too hot in the summer. They use a fan heater which has a frost setting, to keep it above freezing in the winter. As you can imagine its going off all the time at the moment. And a big expensive electric/oil heater thing (which admittedly does a good job)

They ignored me when I said they should fit a wood burner and/or underfloor heating when it was being built.

So, my advice to you? Don’t get one, if you need the space build an extension or save the money for a house move. If you do insist on going for one then think of heating and air con for the summer

We just use ours as a fridge for about 4 months a year. Left the original outside door on the house when it was built, correct decision IMO- keeps the cold out and retains some security (the conservatory’s locks are terrible, and attached to a flimsy frame in a building made out of glass- rock solid)

We movd into our new new house mid december and that has one, dwarf walls, all glass walls and reflective glass roof. We get sun from late morning until the end of the day.

Its been baltic since we moved in. So cold infact that i broke the door handle trying to lock the door in the night after letting the dog out. We’re in two minds about what to do with it. Build a proper extension where it is and open the kitchen up or change the design a bit. We have started looking into putting a different roof on it. Its basically a plastic solid insulated roof with mock tile effect roof (sounds great when you put it like that!!) with a couple of sky lights. Have been told they make the room much warmer. Might be worth a look.

skiprat

Same as ours, but as I said first thing we did was spur a rad off the house. Keeps it above freezing.

I don’t think you are ‘allowed’ to have them open to the house without exterior quality doors unless it complies with certain insulation requirements.

We did an extension about four years ago – originally discussed a conservatory but opted for a slate roof (with Velux) with loads of glass to two sides and a solid wall adjoining the neighbour’s property.

It is also open-plan – we orinally planned concertina doors in the opening but during the build decided we wanted it open so we went back to the planning office and they approved it on the basis that we had to fit DG with some special gas in it. Obviously this was more expensive than standard DG but it was cheaper than the doors we were going to fit.

And we are very relieved we didn’t do the conservatory as it remains perfectly warm in winter and not too hot in the summer.

Here’s a pic…

I know someone who had a large conservatory built – it cut out most the light making the lounge dark and gloomy. They ended up having 2 new windows fitted to get some light into the room.

We inherited on when we moved into our current house. It’s a good quality one – dwarf walls, hardwood frame and reflective glazing all round.

We set it up as a the kids playroom.

When we get enough cash saved up, we’re going to knock it down and build a proper extension. It’s too cold in winter and an oven in summer (south facing). Prior to owning one, I’d always quite fancied the idea. Not now though.

Grandparnts have two, one’s got a propper roof and no door to the house though so that’s probably proerly insulated.

They use them all year round so must be warm enough. They do live in a large, but fairly dark cottage though so it’s appealing compared to the living room in anything but freezing weather/rain.

They’re also really good gardeners. Not just a lawn and borders, there must be hundreds/thousands of plants, a pond, couple of sumemr houses, chicken hutch (with chickens) dovecote etc and a view out into the mountains. So the conservatory is actualy somewhere you can enjoy that on a less than brilliant day.

A client of mine had one, too hot in the summer, too cold in the winter until I put a false ceiling in it with insulation on top….overjoyed he was, bloody fantastic. He can use it all year round.

Did this to my conservatory too. We use it everyday, it is the kids/music room.

you’re all thinking about it wrong. In winter they are in fact a giant walk in fridge. And as such a great place to keep yer booze.