If last week's sweltering heatwave was a sharp reminder of how quickly our homes can warm up, you certainly aren't alone! Keeping our homes cool is becoming a top priority for many of us. Over on the Carbon Co-op Community Forum, a post sharing the Good Homes Alliance’s guidance on overheating has sparked a fantastic discussion full of DIY ingenuity and practical advice.

Our members have been sharing their hands-on solutions for shading south-facing windows to block out the sun. Highlights include a brilliant project by Tim, who built a narrow, freestanding pergola against his back wall to act as a brise soleil (sun shade). By keeping it detached, he cleverly avoided thermal bridging—and he even topped it with solar panels to generate an extra 860Wp of energy while keeping his kitchen cool!

Other members have been weighing in on the pros and cons of external bamboo blinds for dappled shade versus the ease of internal perfect-fit blinds paired with window foliage.

Whether you are looking for a quick interim fix or planning a permanent shading structure, this thread is a goldmine of peer-to-peer knowledge. Have a cooling hack that helped you survive last week's high temperatures? We’d love to hear it.