There is a particular pleasure in a cottage in winter: the low ceiling, the deep windowsill, the kettle coming to the boil while rain runs down the glass. Getting to that point takes a little thought, though, because old houses work on different principles from modern ones. The good news is that most of what keeps a cottage warm and dry costs very little and asks only for a bit of routine.

Why Older Homes Behave Differently

Stone, cob and brick walls, lime mortar and plaster, suspended timber floors — these were built to breathe. Moisture moves through the fabric, dries outwards and escapes through chimneys, air bricks and the natural gaps around old joinery. That is not a fault; it is the design. The trouble starts when we seal everything up, crank the heating up and trap the moisture indoors, where it settles on the coldest surfaces: window panes, north-facing corners, the back of a wardrobe.

A household of four adds roughly ten to fifteen litres of water vapour to the air every day through cooking, washing, drying clothes and simply breathing. In a sealed cottage that vapour has nowhere to go, and condensation, black spots of mould and that distinctive musty smell soon follow. The aim is not to make the house airtight. It is to keep it warm, keep a little air moving, and stop moisture from settling.

Deal With the Draughts Before the Thermostat

On a windy day, run the back of your hand slowly around window frames, skirting boards, the loft hatch and the front door. Those cold ribbons of air are where your heat is leaving. Most can be sorted in an afternoon with materials from a hardware shop.

• Fit brush or foam draught strips to sash and casement windows, and to the frames of external doors.
• Make or buy a door sausage — rice, lentils or sawdust in a long fabric tube — and lay it along the bottom of the front door each evening.
• Cover keyholes with a small flap and fit a brush strip inside the letterbox.
• Push a chimney balloon up the flue when the fire is not lit, but always remove it before lighting a fire.
• Seal the loft hatch with a foam strip, and check that any wall vents or air bricks remain clear.

Close internal doors so you heat the rooms you are using, but keep unused rooms at a low background temperature rather than shutting them off entirely. A cold room next to a warm one is where condensation forms first.

Let Thick Curtains Do the Heavy Lifting

Windows are the weakest point in any old wall. A lined curtain of decent weight, hung on a track fixed close to the ceiling or wall, makes a remarkable difference — far more than the same money spent on extra heating. Choose thermal or interlined fabric, and let curtains reach the floor or at least well below the sill, so cold air cannot pool behind them.

A simple pelmet or fabric valance stops warm air sliding down behind the curtain and chilling. Open curtains in the morning to let in light and any sun, then close them at dusk to hold the warmth in. Keep radiators clear of fabric, and if you have shutters, use them. Where single glazing remains, a sheet of secondary glazing film stretched across the frame is cheap and surprisingly effective.

Ventilate Little and Often

This is the habit that prevents most damp problems, and it costs nothing. Rather than leaving a window ajar all day, throw several windows open for ten to fifteen minutes, twice a day — first thing in the morning and again before bed. Open windows on opposite sides to create a through-draught. The walls and furniture stay warm while the moist air is flushed out.

Keep trickle vents open. Use extractor fans in the kitchen and bathroom and let them run for ten minutes after you finish. Put lids on saucepans. Dry laundry outdoors when you can, or in one room with the door shut and a window open — never draped over radiators if you can avoid it, as that sends every drop of moisture straight into the air.

Small Habits That Keep Damp at Bay

Pull wardrobes, beds and sofas a few inches away from external walls so air can circulate behind them. Check gutters and downpipes twice a year: an overflowing gutter is one of the commonest causes of a damp patch spreading across an inside wall. Make sure external soil or paving sits below the damp-proof course, and that air bricks are not blocked by planters or insulation.

Deal with mould early. Wipe small patches with a diluted solution, then work out what is causing it — it is nearly always a combination of cold surfaces and trapped moisture rather than a failing building. Keep living rooms at a steady eighteen to twenty degrees and try not to let any part of the house fall below about fifteen, as condensation becomes far more likely below that point.

Slow living in a cottage is largely a matter of paying attention: opening a window, closing a curtain, sweeping a chimney, stacking logs somewhere dry. Do those small things regularly and the house gives you back exactly what you wanted from it — a warm, dry, quiet place to be while the weather does its worst outside.