It's clear that our clients' most popular building material is aerated concrete. In second place, by a wide margin, is porous ceramic block. The other structural materials are fairly exotic. I think this popularity is hard for us to fully explain — this is true across central and northern Russia.

For cold regions, no one has yet come up with the ideal wall, so people quite reasonably prefer these less-than-ideal materials.

We give our clients technical solutions for finishing walls and protect them from mistakes. But there are far more readers than clients, so I want to warn readers: these materials aren't endangered by precipitation, as many think — their enemy is moisture inside the house.

The biggest misunderstanding among builders and tradespeople is this: in winter, moisture from inside a warm house escapes heavily through the porous walls into the cold, dry air outside. To vapor, gas and ceramic blocks are a sieve.

So, people! Don't trap moisture in the walls with a layer of finish or insulation! It's dangerous to both the finish and the integrity of the whole house. I'm writing this because I've seen far too many houses foolishly ruined by improper finishing.