10 Ridiculous Ways to Keep Your House From Being Drafty This Winter

A mostly sarcastic guide for the first cold snap

It’s getting cold. You’ve noticed. The thermostat has noticed. The dog has relocated to the one sunny patch of carpet and refuses to negotiate. Here at AE, we are building science nerds, the type who get misty-eyed over U-factors and bring up spacer bars at dinner parties. We can’t help it. 

So when the first chill rolls in, we have thoughts. Below are ten ways people try to beat a drafty house. Most of them are silly and ridiculous. A couple are secretly brilliant. See if you can spot which…

1. Roll up a towel and shove it against the door. Bonus points if it’s the “fancy” towels.
2. Wear a parka indoors. Out here we’re trained to wear lots of layers wherever you go around town since the weather can change on a dime, so why not in your own house?!
3. Crank the thermostat to 78. Your furnace works harder, your bill climbs, and the cold spots stay exactly where they were.
4. Shrink-wrap the windows with plastic film and a hair dryer. Part craft project, part science experiment, and it looks like you’re preserving leftovers.
5. Hang a heavy blanket over the window. Cave chic is having a moment.
6. Rearrange the furniture away from the windows. Congratulations, your living room is now a third smaller!
7. Sit on the stairs and feel the cold air rushing around your body. Dumb? Sort of. But if a river of chilly air is pouring down your stairwell, you’ve just found your home’s cold air delivery system.
8. Embrace the Cold! We’ve all heard about cold plunging being all the rage, but now you can do contrast therapy in your own home. Go from warm shower to cold without ever leaving your home! 
9. Grab a laser thermometer and a roll of painter’s tape. When it’s about 30°F outside, stick small pieces of tape on your window glass and frames, then point the thermometer at the tape. If the surface reads more than 7°F below your room temperature (say, 68°F), you’re likely feeling “drafts” that are really convection currents. Yes, you will look ridiculous. Yes, it works.
10. Wait until spring and pretend none of this happened. We’ll be here. But, we actually recommend you talk to us sooner!

So What’s Really Going On?

Here’s the sneaky part. On a calm day, much of what feels like a draft is a convection current. A cold window surface chills the room air touching it, that air sinks and slides across your floor, and warm air moves in to take its place. Then it all repeats, all winter. Add air leaking through gaps around windows and doors, and you have a tiny weather system living on your couch. If you feel a draft, your windows and doors are probably contributing through both air infiltration and thermal performance. Want the full science? Read our deep dive on convection currents.

Holler at us!

Before you suffer through a winter full of drafts and frustration, give us a call at 720-287-4290 or contact us online. We’ll talk windows and doors that keep interior surfaces warm and drafts out, and we promise to keep the nerdiness to a manageable level. Mostly.