Vintage View: Domestic central heating

As we all dust off those radiator valves and fine tune the digital controls, Kya deLongchamps gives us a short history of the wonder that is domestic central heating.

Modern central heating did not appear as an answer to the twin joys of the freezing back/roasted front of the Georgian fireplace at home.

It was born on the mill and factory floor to keep workers at their place during the freezing length of a 19th century winter. It was a luxury accorded to the tropical flowers and fruits in the greenhouses of the aristocracy.