This weekend we will be at The Bell House Festival of Retrofit where there will be a series of workshops and talks on retrofitting your home to make it more climate resilient. A selection of Blue Patch members’ work will be on display, including Chimney Sheep’s ‘chimney sheep’ which prevents warm air from escaping up your chimney.
Sally Phillips, the founder of Chimney Sheep, has some quick fixes for draught proofing your home.
Why does draught proofing matter?
Uncontrolled gaps in your home allow cold air in and warm air out. This increases your energy bill as your heating system has to work harder and run more often to compensate for the loss of warm air. Sealing any gaps will improve the comfort of your home and reduce the effects of cold and damp, which is linked to poorer indoor air quality and health issues.
Sally says “There are some easy and relatively cheap wins when it comes to making your home more energy efficient.”
Here are Chimney Sheep’s top five tips for draught proofing your home:
1/ Draught-proof the chimney. An open chimney will syphon 80 cubic metres of air out of a room per hour. This pulls in cold air from other leaky parts of the building, causing the cold draughts we notice. Always start with the fireplace. Use a Chimney Sheep to block the nearest, narrowest part of the flue. If you have a gas fire then you must not block the flue but you can use a magnetic fireplace blanket , so long as you don’t have a lit pilot light.
If you have a log burning stove, you will not need a Chimney Sheep but if you are noticing draughts from it then you may need to replace the rope seal around the doors.
2/ Insulate and draught-proof the loft hatch. Even if you haven’t got a chimney, warm air will rise up through the house and create a stack effect if it can find an exit. Put a window seal draught-proofing strip around the perimeter of the loft hatch where it sits on the ledge. On the back of the hatch, put a layer of insulation. We supply “A Useful Bit of Insulation” that can be used for this. Or use a section of our Herdwick wool underlay, cut to fit and stapled on.
3/ Look for all the gaps – around plumbing, holes drilled for electrical cables, gas pipes, etc. Bung these with a wool gap filler.
4/ Check doors and windows – and fit draught seal tape if you can feel any air coming through. Look around window frames, inside and out. Although these are fitted to save energy, if they are badly fitted they will be a source of air leakage around the outside. Also use door draught excluders to block cold draughts from under doors.
5/ Letterboxes – can be a massive source of heat loss, hiding in plain sight. Letterbox covers are cheap to buy, easy to fit and deliver instant draught-stopping results. Key-holes can similarly be a source of nuisance cold draughts – fit these with an escutcheon keyhole cover.
In an uninsulated or poorly insulated home, 65% of the generated heat escapes. It goes through the walls, roof and loft, floors (especially suspended floors), windows and doors, and of course the chimney and letter box. These simple tips from Chimney Sheep can help to address many of the biggest causes of heat loss in the home.
The Bell House Festival of Retrofit is on Sunday 7th June 2026 from 11.30-3.30. To find out more about chimney sheep or any of the Chimney Sheep products that can improve your home insulation, please visit www.chimneysheep.co.uk