7 American Assumptions About Air Conditioning I Unlearned After Moving to Paris
What seven summers in Paris taught me about heat, comfort, and living with the seasons
This past week Paris reached 32°C (90°F) almost every single day. The week before, it was still 15°C (60°F).
I grew up in the U.S. with air conditioning everywhere. In the house. In the car. In the office. In restaurants. In stores.
Heat belonged outdoors. When I moved to Paris, my relationship to heat collided with a different cultural lens.
Here, heat is collective. The whole city experiences the same temperatures together. I grew up in a worldview where temperatures were adjusted to my individual comfort.
Our apartment is a new build on the 4th floor, south and west facing. I've spent the past few summers learning exactly how it behaves in heat and what keeps it liveable. For most of this past week, it was 32°C outside and 24–26°C inside. Not my ideal, but comfortable so I’m not sitting in the dark sweating.
Here are seven assumptions I unlearned — and what I discovered along the way.
1. You can open the windows whenever
I check the weather the night before and again in the morning to find the coolest hour of the day. That’s when every window needs to be open. The morning is the only real opportunity to change what the temperature feels like.
Once the outdoor temperature reaches around 24°C (usually 10am) is when all the windows shut. Whatever cool air we’ve brought in stays in.
2. Window treatments are only a decorative decision
This is where interior design and heat management meet. Window treatments may seem like a decorative decision, but every layer is also doing thermal work. Each layer does a specific job:
Exterior stores or volets — block before the sun reaches the glass
Interior stores — useful for controlling light without full blackout
Voilage (sheer) — filters light while creating a layer of still air
Rideaux (curtains) — the final layer, for when you want full darkness or maximum insulation
UV films — adheres to glass, blocks heat without blocking light; useful where exterior stores aren’t possible, and renter-friendly
The most common mistakes: curtains that don’t reach the floor, or a window relying on a single layer. Once sun enters and heats your floors and furniture, the room stores that heat until it can be relieved by cooler air temps.
3. Comfort at the press of a button
The biggest shift for me mentally was understanding I was no longer cooling air on command — I was now managing the sun.
Once direct sunlight enters your space and begins heating your floors, walls, and furniture, the apartment stores that heat. Exterior stores or volets or UV films are the most effective. If you have them, use them.
4. Rooms are “on” all the time
Just as I turn off a light when I leave a room, I now think about closing off spaces I’m not occupying. If I’m not going to be in a room that day, I put down the volets, close the door, and black it out. That room stays cooler and doesn’t contribute heat to the rest of the apartment.
I think of it like turning off a faucet.
5. The sun is the only heat source
On days above 30°C I try not to use the oven after 10am. We switch to cold meals like gazpacho, tomato and mozzarella, melon and prosciutto, cold pasta. For drinks, it’s cold brew coffee and tea, and water.
The biggest heat generators inside a Paris apartment are often the oven and stove, the TV, and towel heaters in the bathroom.
6. Fans cool air
Fans don’t cool air like air conditioning, but they cool us by moving air across our skin. Point them at yourself, not at a wall. And at night and when the morning air is cool, positioning a fan to draw cool air in from a window while another pushes warm air out helps.
We have 3 fans for our 2 bedroom apartment. Each one serves a different purpose.
The Muji fan is quiet, minimal, and lives in our daughter’s bedroom.
The Dyson purified fan circulates and purifies the air without noise. It’s in our living room during the day and moves to our bedroom at night.
Our Rowenta fan has been with us for years and handles the heavy lifting. We keep it in the living room, directly opposite the Dyson to keep air moving.
7. Not having AC means you can’t afford it
In the U.S., not having air conditioning can read as poverty — as something you couldn’t afford.
In France, not having air conditioning is how most people live, regardless of income. There’s no social weight attached to it.
My first few summers here, I noticed what happened when I was talking with someone from home — a family member, a friend from high school or college, someone I used to work with. They’d ask about the weather and a sentence like “we don’t have AC” would slip out. Their sense of pity blanketing me for having chosen this country, this city — this way of living.
The Paris people imagine from abroad is not the Paris that one lives. It’s not a vacation. Learning to live with the season instead of against it has changed how I experience summer — and how I design interiors for it.
Stay cool and hydrated, friends.
If this helped — or if you have a tip — I’d love to hear it in the comments.
— Shana
About the Author:
Hello, bonjour. I’m Shana, an interior designer in Paris who grew up in the U.S. I have lived between cultures my entire life — Vietnamese mother, Jewish American father, French Vietnamese husband — and now I help people feel at home in theirs.
I moved to Paris in 2019, just weeks after marrying the French man I met on a spontaneous trip to London. That move marked the beginning of a completely different life and career.
I enrolled in a Master’s in Interior Decoration and Decorative Arts, studying entirely in French — a language I barely spoke at the time.
Today, I translate your cultures into interiors. I help people who live between identities create spaces that feel like you — all of you.
This newsletter is where I share what I’m noticing — in Paris, in my home, and in the spaces in between.
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I have always loved a life lived with the seasons, but with temperatures intensifying we have to have a bit of a back up toolkit for those record breaking days. My go-to (which you’ll definitely find a lot of Brits doing), is a cold foot bath, or running cold water over your wrists if you don’t have time to fill a bath or bucket. Because our blood vessels are so close to the surface on your wrists, and there’s a high density of veins in your feet it’s a brilliant way to transfer heat out of your body.
I am loving all of the essays on A/C (or lack thereof) in Paris this week! Your tips are spot on. One of the most important things is creating a "courant d'air" (cross-breeze) in the morning and at night by opening up as many windows as you can - just watch out for any slamming doors :)