This is a contributed post. Victorian houses are extremely popular. And for good reason – Victorian houses are solidly built, often have large rooms with high ceilings and, of course, they have tons of character. Unfortunately though, despite electricity being available at the end of the Victorian era, the cost of electricity prohibited most households from having it.
I’m sure if Victorians had hairdryers, straighteners, air-fryers, microwaves, mobile phones and laptops, they’d have embraced electricity sooner. But they didn’t – Victorians had telegraphs, tin baths and typhoid.
So, if you have a Victorian house, you might have gorgeous fireplaces, cornices and bay windows but you probably don’t have as many plug sockets as you’d like. You win some, you lose some.
What to do if you haven’t got enough plug sockets
If you live in a brand new housing development, either privately or on one of the government-backed help to buy schemes, you’re probably chuckling to yourself as you look around at your plentiful plug sockets.
But if you’re in a beautiful but plug-socket-bereft period property, here are a few solutions to your power socket woes.
Install more plug sockets
I’m going to start with the obvious solution first. If you need more plug sockets, the best way to get more is to have more installed.
However, this may be an obvious solution but it’s far from the cheapest or simplest. New plug sockets will involve a great deal of expense and inconvenience. You’ll need an electrician such as an Electrician in Dayton to do the actual installation and then a decorator to make good the damage that will have been done to your walls.
It goes without saying that installing plug sockets isn’t something you should attempt to do yourself. Unless you’re a qualified electrician, that is. And if you are, you’re probably not reading this post.
Power strips
Power strips are simply extension leads with a few sockets on them. They come in a range of cable lengths and the long ones are a great way to add more sockets in rooms where you need them.
If you’re using a power strip to give yourself some sockets on the opposite side of a wall, although cables running across the floor are an unsightly trip hazard, don’t be tempted to run the cables under rugs to keep them out of the way, as people walking on them can cause damage to the cable, which is a fire risk.
To keep the cables out of the way, you can secure the cable along skirting boards and over door frames and affix the power strip to the wall at a height that’s good for you. It’s not the prettiest solution, but it’s an effective one.
Go wireless
Some appliances take just too much power to be wireless. I’m sure there’ll be a time when we have wireless televisions, fridge-freezers and washing machines in our homes but that time is not yet.
You can do away with some plugs though – for example, if you need a lamp by your bed but you haven’t got a socket, install a smart bulb into your ceiling light and tell your smart home assistant to turn the bulb on and off.
Also, gone are the days of stacked stereo systems taking up an entire wall in most houses. Invest in a wireless Bluetooth speaker and you can have music wherever you want it.
Safety first
These are just three ways to have more power sockets around your home. Remember though, safety first! This means no daisy-chaining power strips, no overloading double plugs and no running cables under rugs.
Of course, if you’ve got any major home improvement plans coming up, this would be an ideal time to install more plug sockets. Until then though, the above tips should keep you going.
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