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Maintaining the spirit of original décor
 That's the philosophy that Craig Wormsley has brought to the renovation of his five-bedroom Victorian family home. Built in 1879, the house is situated only a few hundred metres from Launceston's CBD.
Craig and his partner have spent over four and a half years meticulously restoring the elderly Victorian to her former beauty. According to Craig there are still many more years of work ahead. But as you can see from the photographs, the hundreds of hours of labour are paying off. Pressed tin pelmets decorated in gold leaf, intricately detailed cornices and magnificent Baltic pine floorboards are just a few of the treasures hidden beneath a 1970s linoleum and white paint make-over.
 While maintaining the spirit of the original décor, Craig has not been a slave to Victoriana. To enable Craig to experience mod cons the entire house has been rewired. The set-up has allowed each living area to have speakers in the ceiling so that music can be piped from a central console.
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Innovative heating
 The rewiring also keeps the Victorian giantess as warm and cosy as a quaint little cottage. This is because upstairs in one of the renovated bedrooms and the bathroom, there's under-floor heating that is controlled thermostatically. According to Craig, even though the rooms have high ceilings, this unobtrusive source of warmth works a treat.
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Instant heat
Downstairs, however, is the pièce de résistance. This is the main living area where heating is needed to warm up the rooms instantly on winter mornings and evenings. Providing heating for five rooms that are each at least twenty square metres with three-metre ceilings sounds like a real pain in the hip pocket. But with the help of Aurora Preferred Suppliers, Craig found the answer.
The type of heating that was installed is termed an "individual floor heater". Unlike a central heating system, each unit is independent of those in other rooms and has the appearance of a ducted system with an unobtrusive grill. To install the unit, a hole was cut in the floor, into which the heater was placed blower side up, flush to the floorboards. A vent was then permanently positioned over the heater. The unit is controlled manually or with a thermostat.
The individual direct units used in each of the five downstairs rooms are 3 kilowatts in capacity. Now, if you're thinking that a total of 15 kilowatts of power will make for an expensive heating bill (let alone the underfloor heating upstairs), think again.
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Economical
"During the last winter quarter our bill was only between four and five hundred dollars – which we thought was pretty good," said Craig.
When you consider the size of the rooms and the number of rooms, that's very good. The secret to the economy of the individual floor heaters is, in fact, their individuality.
You are only paying for the heating you use rather than paying for heating unoccupied rooms. And because the units are so powerful it means that Craig can move into another room and use the ducted unit to heat it up fast.
And fast it is. Craig, who works in Hobart as a hairdresser, travels back to Launceston every few days and says that it makes a frosty reception at home a thing of the past.
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Unobtrusive
Quite apart from their power and efficiency, individual floor heaters were an ideal choice for Craig's home. Unlike other wired-in direct heaters they do not require the use of wall panels, which would have contrasted strangely with the period atmosphere. Also the vent itself is complementary to the overall look of the home. Individual ducted units require an underfloor clearance of about 55 centimetres, which can be excavated if there isn't sufficient room under the house. The unit is best placed in the coldest area of the room, which is usually under a window.
And you can be sure that the house when finished will look magnificent. Because, as with everything else that has been done to his home from rewiring to planting the garden, Craig will always adhere to his philosophy of doing it once – but doing it right.
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