For the 20-odd years since I moved to Britain from the US, I’ve had to put up with this weather snobbery from my fellow citizens, who can’t comprehend the concept of architecture built for specific climates, even after that snowstorm in Texas.
Americans do not understand British heat. It doesn’t compute. Surely it’s all rain and brollies and pea soup? That’s what I thought when I moved here, moaning to a friend “why is it so hotttttt” while they looked at me in disgust and said, “because it’s August”. Rude.
Spectators try to cool down at Wimbledon’s All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club on Tuesday (Photo: Stephanie Lecocq/ Reuters)
In the US, most homes have Arctic winds to blast through every room for three solid months, and if they don’t, there are window units: drippy, unsightly boxes hanging precariously off the sides of buildings held in place with only a sash window and a wall plug. At the very least, American buildings have windows (and SCREENS!!!) that open in such a way as to install fans to suck air in or out, maintaining a velvet rope for the bugs and birds.
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UK heatwaves are an entirely different type of horror: our homes are built to retain heat because the climate they were built for is dank. My flat is cozy in winter but a pizza oven in summer. Same for our public transport: anyone who has ever entered London’s Elephant and Castle Tube knows exactly what I mean when you turn that one corner and the heat hits you like a wall, and that’s before you sardine yourself into a Tube carriage or onto a bus with only the barest breeze coming through the windows as you’re stuck in traffic.
In the past few years I have slowly Americanised my flat by installing ceiling fans in every room, and it has made such a world of difference. I’m basically a religious convert, street-witnessing, wide-eyed, Have you heard the good news about ceiling fans?! But even my little flat running a full-tilt horizontal wind farm can’t battle days like these. I can’t even bear to think about the electricity bill – that’s a Next Month Cat problem.
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