[citrin_ru]

If you live in a brick/stone hours you can still go a long way by maximally ventilating house at nigh and during the day keeping sun out (shutters, awning e.t.c) and keep ventilation minimal. It would not help if the nights are warm (so you'd need AC) but there are still many more days with cold nights and by using shutters and timed ventilation you can reduce AC energy use.

AC full on without other measures and passive thermal control techniques are no only two available options, one can combine them.

[DougN7]

Many years ago I lived in a brick apartment and the afternoon/evening sun would hit the wall next to my bedroom, making it very hot at night. I started going out with buckets of water to splash on the wall a few times each evening and it made a real difference. A white sheet hung across the wall might have helped more. Lots of things can be done if you don’t mind looking silly :) Unless you’re in the an area with high temp and high humidity. That is bad.

[throwawayffffas]

Retractable awnings are very common including in residential setups in southern Europe.

[vladvasiliu]

Do those also cover the apartment walls? I've only seen large awnings covering walls in detached houses, and even then it's relatively rare to cover walls that aren't close to doors.

[throwawayffffas]

Usually no, most of the times the walls that have the longest sun exposure have terraces/balconies and awnings.