1 comments about In Detail: High-Density Housing: Concepts, Planning, Construction (In Detail (englisch)).

1. The book contains some great projects that concern examples of high-density housing. The texts are short and to the points, accompanied by good photographs and drawings (plans/details).
   As for the book itself, the paper-wrapped cover can damage quickly and the book could use some more projects considering it's price tag. Still, This edition (as with the entire In Detail series) is very much recommended for architecture students and architects looking for good books that show interesting projects in drawing and detail.

5 comments about The Rustic Cabin.

1. Great pictures pair with many ideas for turning your house into a rustic dream home.



2. Wonderful photography, well written chapters, and many, many decorating ideas. My wife and I really enjoyed this book. We decorate our home in a rustic style, and hope to have our own cabin in the Blue Ridge Mountains one day. However, a better title for this book might have been "Cabins of the Rich and Famous"; these aren't the little cabins your grandparent's owned, or those that most people could afford.
   
   It is a great coffee table book if this is your area of interest, and will inspire you with building, design, and decorating ideas.



3. This is an excellent book on the topic of the adirondacks and adirondack home. Ralph Kylloe always does a fantastic job with pictures and text. It was a very worhtwhile purchase.
   Thanks
   G. Cerank



4. There's nothing "rustic" about these luxury ranch homes, and the word "cabin" is definitely a euphemism. The houses are as big and gorgeous as the settings they reside in, and the author's photographs capture both. If you want the vicarious thrill of seeing how the rich spend their summers in Montana, then book is for you.



5. Look inside this book at a bookstore before you buy it. It is NOT about cabins but about huge lodges-log mansions, if you will.

5 comments about Home: A Short History of an Idea.

1. Fascinating history of the home from the Middle Ages to the 20th century, with a focus on how the built domestic environment influences us and vice versa. The cultural focus is western and European.



2. May be of interest to househunters trying to envision what their happy home to be might want to be. It's basically a selective history of the concepts of home and comfort, related to changing forms of the family, over the last four or five hundred years. It's full of interesting factoids, probably ultimately of less significance than Rybczynski had hoped, but he's a good writer and charming (a hair too warm and fuzzy for me). It's a light, easy and pleasant read. It didn't leave me with anything of substance that stuck in my memory, but I definitely enjoyed reading it. It's the type of book you curl up with next to a fire with a skim mocha nutmeg and cinnamon whatever when you need to give your brain a break but can't quite stoop to watching American Idol. Okay, sorry - it's a much better book than that. And it's fun - and we all probably need to have a little fun now and then (in between reading all these serious books and growing our big, fat brains). But in the end it's not really substantial.



3. You probably have notions about what "home" means, and those notions probably revolve around your immediate family, domestic comfort and convenience, with a dash of nostalgia. Most likely you share my sense that home has been thus for a long time, subject to the whims of fashion and demands of social hierarchy. What I learned from Witold Rybczynski is that those are very near-sighted suppositions. The modern (Western) idea of a home is very new, historically. Even the notion of "family" that occupies so much of modern political cant, and seems so central to our social organization, goes back no further than the early 18th Century. Households before that time were comprised of groups of working adults, house owners and employees and servants, plus infants. Children were farmed out as apprentices at a tender age -- even in the wealthiest households where fortunate youngsters were placed as servants to courtiers and nobles in order to learn the ropes of oligarchy. Privacy was rare. Beds were built to handle 6-8 adults and work tables often tripled as dining boards and sleeping platforms. Rybczynski artfully traces the development of the modern household, decor and furnishing, to enable a deep understanding of why we live as we do, what works and what doesn't. As an architect he reserves some of his harshest criticism for his fellows, and neatly shoots down such icons as Le Corbusier and Wright who were too hung on their brilliance to notice that things weren't working. (As I reported in my review of Stewart Brand's excellent HOW BUILDINGS LEARN, Viking, 1994, most -- if not all -- of Frank Lloyd Wright's houses leaked, badly. HOME reports that they didn't work as living quarters either.) This author's highest praise falls to the women who invented household engineering in the late 1800s, stepping into the architectural void, inventing home economics, and shaping the modern home to suit the needs of a servantless woman charged with housekeeping and child rearing. Catherine E. Beecher and Ellen Richards come in for particular commendation. Modern furniture also falls under the author's verbal axe. Designed for style instead of comfort, he describes its advent as a foolish embrace of creativity above function, and offers the detailed research in France under the Louises (Louies?), which erupted as Chippendale and Hepplewhite designs: templates which carefully noted dimensions and proportions that actually fit a human body and allowed for the constant movement necessary to ongoing comfort. The only modern chairs which come near to the standard set in those classic designs are found in the best mechanical chairs, made to be adjusted to the user's body and to flex with movement. (More often to be found in office furniture than in a home.) Altogether an illuminating look at the circumstances of our lives. For this reviewer, who spent 20 years inventing an "alternative" house from scratch, it is greatly amusing to learn that I have spent a lot of hours reinventing wheels rounded out a hundred years ago. Talk about being forced to repeat history one has failed to learn! Been there. And so it goes.



4. Home is an articulate, rapid reading book about the developements leading to the current concept of "home". Tying history, architecture, sociology and technology together the emerging concept of home and comfort developes in clear visualizations.
   After reading this book I now appreciate the evolution of the contradictory outlooks over time and how they affect our current drives in creating our personal living spaces.



5. Witold Rybczynski's Home: A Short History Of An Idea, is an historical and informational text following the devlopment of the concept of home and discusses the psychological effects of different types of dwellings and personal space, architecture, and society. Home is a well-structured and planned tracing of society's development of the concepts of home and comfort and relates to today's audiences with a new perspective on where and how they live. One of Mr. Rybczynski's strengths as a writer is his conversational writing style and the flow of the organization of his main ideas.
   Home instantly dives into the development of society's ideas of comfort and home with an almost staggering jump into a strong comparison and analysis of the four style lines of the Ralph Lauren collection. Mr. Rybczynski highlights the different aspects of the setting that Lauren creates to entice the public and the different props he uses to create this feeling of home. Home utilizes the time line approach, begining in the medieval era, to explain Ralph Lauren's heightend understanding of the public's ideas of comfort. Mr. Rybczynski also examines the work of Le Corbusier and relates the modernist movement with current modern trends.
   Mr. Rybczynski's book remeinds architects and interior designers that even in today's society it is easy to get caught up in what is in style or what would make a statement rather than what is comfertable for occupants to inhabit. I recommend Mr. Rybczynski's book to anyone who would appreciate seeing their home in a whole new way.

2 comments about The Bathroom Book: The Ultimate Design Resource for the Home's Most Essential Space.

1. I found just what I needed in this book. The photographs are splendid, and the ideas are inspirational. This book works for me.
   As far as resources are concerned however, you are just referred to the designer, so if you're doing some of the remodeling yourself, which I am, you can only use this book for ideas, not to track down the individual products photographed. That said, this book has helped me tremendously with my planning decisions.



2. I am about to totally gut my master bathroom and increase the size by incorporating two adjacent closets. It will still be on the small side but I was pleasantly surprised to find that this book covers the very small to the grandiose in size and style. The author discusses practical considerations when choosing each component of the bathroom and highlights common mistakes and misconceptions. There are lots of ideas and a selection of floor plans and whilst you cannot expect any of them to be tailor made for your house, they are a valuable resource to build upon. I would recommend this book if you are thinking of redesigning your bathroom.

4 comments about Thomas Jefferson's Monticello.

1. Thomas Jefferson's Monticello, an essay in architecture, takes readers on a historical tour of the third U.S. president's cherished home near Charlottesville, Virginia, through well-written text and gorgeous, full-color photography. The book includes floor plans and photographs of Jefferson's original architectual elevations, as well as drawings of the finished building that we are most familiar with today. It describes Jefferson as art collector and plantation life on Monticello's farms, and it explores the four seasons in Monticello's gardens. Published in 2002 by the Thomas Jefferson Foundation, Inc.



2. This work successfully links the many unique qualities of Thomas Jefferson's personality to the unique qualities of the home that he designed and spent most of his life building and rebuilding. All of the intriguing features of this home are covered.
   Anyone interested in this remarkable man and his home who is unable to visit Monticello in person should strongly consider this work.



3. This is a highly informative, well documented book covering all aspects of the design and building of Thomas Jefferson's home, plus insights into why things were done the way they were done, through Jefferson's own notes, sketches and correspondence. Plus,the photographs are exquisite.



4. One of the clichés about Monticello is that few houses do so good a job revealing the personality of its builder. But clichés get to be such generally because there's truth to them, and that's definitely the case here. If Thomas Jefferson was one of the most interesting figures in American history (and I think that's unquestionably true), then Monticello may well be one of America's most interesting houses. And for this colorful book produced by the Thomas Jefferson Foundation, we are guided through the house and grounds by people who know their stuff.

   Specifically, the chapters of this title are written by Monticello's director of restoration, the curator, the director of gardens and grounds, and other experts associated with the Foundation. Large, colorful photos are accompanied by informed commentary and all the requisite history, as well as documentation of the decades of restoration work it has taken to get the house and grounds to its current condition. A book doesn't make up for a visit in person -- if anything, I wished for more photos of the interior, especially of the book room and "cabinet." But for a general overview of the house, grounds, and collection, and an insight into the man himself, this book is hard to beat. I recommend it as a souvenir, as well as a nice companion to a Jefferson biography.

5 comments about Understanding Buildings: A Multidisciplinary Approach.

1. This text is a great introduction to the world of building systems. It spells out in easliy understandable terminology the basics of many systems with great little sketches to boot. I highly recommend it to anyone interested in learning about how buildings work and are constructed.



2. I am a fan of architecture with little technical background. I was drawn to this book because I wanted to increase my understanding of architecture by learning how the mechanical systems within buildings work. I began this endeavor with E. Allen's "How Buildings Work: The Natural Order of Architecture", perhaps the best introduction to the subject. Having enjoyed that book, I wanted to get to the next level of complexity.
   
   Esmond Reid's "Understanding Buildings" is an intermediate level book. The writing is at college freshman level and was easy to understand for a reader with no engineering or other technical background. The many line drawings helped immeasurably in getting across basic points.
   
   For the true beginner, I would recommend E. Allen's book. If you like that work, "Understanding Buildings" is an exciting progression in beginning to understand how the buildings we interact with on a daily basis work. Highly recommended.



3. This book was written mainly for aspiring architects and civil engineers, and covers almost all types of building systems thoroughly. It is very detailed and has separate chapters for important topics such as structure, climate services, lighting, acoustics, fire safety, etc. Although the author largely stays away from mathematics, he is always clear and concise in dealing even with complex analytical problems. As an example I would give his excellent treatment of two and three-hinged portals, and the fascinating parallels he draws between the engineering ideal of arches and the different types of portals. He covers all major construction techniques from timber platform frame construction (generally of houses), to more complex forms such as the hyperbolic paraboloid (opposed double curvature), and the esoteric "hyperboloid of revolution", the opposed double curvature architecture (almost always in concrete) common in power station cooling towers.

   His writing on accessory systems such as heating, air conditioning, ventilation, and fire detection and prevention are both introductory and comprehensive. In all areas from structure to systems he is careful to explain real-world rationale in an approachable format that is both thorough and easy to understand.

   This book is wonderful. It should be read by every student in engineering or architecture school (the section in chapter one on stresses is of enormous value to technical students), and I would further recommend it to practicing professionals as an excellent conceptual 'refresher course' of real world building systems wisdom. This is an excellent book.




4. This book was written mainly for aspiring architects and civil engineers, and covers almost all types of building systems thoroughly. It is very detailed and has separate chapters for important topics such as structure, climate services, lighting, acoustics, fire safety, etc. Although the author largely stays away from mathematics, he is always clear and concise in dealing even with complex analytical problems. As an example I would give his excellent treatment of two and three-hinged portals, and the fascinating parallels he draws between the engineering ideal of arches and the different types of portals. He covers all major construction techniques from timber platform frame construction (generally of houses), to more complex forms such as the hyperbolic paraboloid (opposed double curvature), and the esoteric "hyperboloid of revolution", the opposed double curvature architecture (almost always in concrete) common in power station cooling towers.

   His writing on accessory systems such as heating, air conditioning, ventilation, and fire detection and prevention are both introductory and comprehensive. In all areas from structure to systems he is careful to explain real-world rationale in an approachable format that is both thorough and easy to understand.

   This book is wonderful. It should be read by every student in engineering or architecture school (the section in chapter one on stresses is of enormous value to technical students), and I would further recommend it to practicing professionals as an excellent conceptual 'refresher course' of real world building systems wisdom. This is an excellent book.




5. It's rare to find an architect who can explain things in such a conversational way. The underlying principles are always laid out, first for a small building and then for a large one, to show the effects of changing scale. For example as the surface area to volume ratio changes, so do heating and cooling demands. And for me it was educational to see the British way of building houses: floor joists over concrete slabs, or brick basements. I learned the dew point drops gradually toward the exterior inside porous materials, and 15 deg east of south is the optimum solar orientation in the Northern hemisphere. And the slogan of the man who invented the revolving door ("It's always closed.")
   The second half of the book covers building services--heating, plumbing etc.--concisely, and it becomes apparent the author has plenty of real world experience and is no mere academic. Lighting, acoustics and fire safety finish the book. Even at 20 years old, still educational.

4 comments about Strawbale Home Plans.

1. I keep this book around on my couch for all my friends to check out and i go back to it, daily, in searching for beautiful ideas for my soon to be breathable abode! The people in the book appear so serene and i know why! what glorious fotos and floorplans this book provided! great work!



2. This product is short on plans but I love it anyway. It provides one diagram, or layout for each ofmany sterling examples of this construction method,
   A good value for that strawbale builder who finds themself somewhere between a dream and the plan coming together...or just wondering where to get started making the dream a reality.



3. i was very impressed, this book is beautiful, the pictures, and floor plans inside give us so many ideas for the home we want to build in the future, i recommed it even if its a coffe table book.



4. I bought this book seeking inspiration, and I was not disappointed. Evident here is the continuing evolvement of strawbale house design and construction. In this book, you can see what can be done with strawbale. Included are comments and suggestions from the owner/builder of each house. For anyone considering building a strawbale structure, these comments would be especially useful. One owner/builder in the desert, for example, says rain gutters should have been installed when the house was first built, not added later on. Photo quality is very nice, and the overall layout and design of the book is quite good. The title of the book is a bit misleading, and I would have liked to see more in the way of actual plans (all you get is a floor plan), but overall this is a nice book, and offers much in the way of ideas.

5 comments about Ancient Rome: Monuments Past and Present.

1. This is a wonderful book. It really fleshes out the remains of Rome's ancient monuments



2. We're planning a trip to Rome and like to prepare by reading about places we'll be seeing. This gives a very good explanation of the Roman building remains in an interesting manner.



3. Great book
   love to see rome then and now
   makes history come alive



4. This book uses overlays to show what Ancient Rome looked like when everything was new and in good shape. Then, you can flip the overlay and see how things look now. I always wondered how things looked then and wished I had a time machine to go back to those days. This book is the second-best thing to a time machine. The artists have done a great job of reconstructing the famous buildings, forums and temples. The book is well worth the money and is less expensive from Amazon than buying it in Rome.



5. This is a great book but way too expensive. I could have bought the exact book in Rome for less than half the price from a vendor at the Colosseum but decided to wait until I got home.

5 comments about Pregnancy Sucks: What to Do When Your Miracle Makes You Miserable.

1. Expecting parents are always worried about the changes and what to expect. This book is funny and informative. It doesn't cover everything but it's still worth picking up. It's a great gift (I've given it a few times) or just a book to add to your collection. I aloso recomend the version written for men.



2. I haven't read this book, nor do I plan to. After two pregnancy losses in the last year, (five months apart, at 20 weeks, and 13 weeks), I would actually prefer being pregnant and miserable. To all you women out there who are pregnant and miserable: I actually envy you. Good Luck to you lucky women out there, and when you hold that baby in your arms for the first time, you will find that everything you're going through is completely worth it!!



3. When I first read this book, I laughed at the first two pages. Then I just ended up feeling sorry for the author's daughter--who will one day read this and learn just how much her mother hated being pregnant with her. Then I was just shocked at how outdated it was. She has such a bitter attitude towards pregnancy, it makes you wonder why she didn't just adopt instead.
   
   On top of that, her information is outdated and one-sided. Aside from interviewing doctors, it seems like she didn't put much research or thought into her pregnancy. Never do we get the entire picture of all our choices when it comes to medical care, labor, and labor pain management. Foods that are healthy (ex- pasteurized soft cheeses) are completely banned in this book.
   
   Parts of pregnancy suck, but it doesn't have to suck that bad. In fact, many of the "unavoidable torture" the author talks about can totally be worked around while keeping mom and baby healthy (and in some cases, safer) than what she suggests.



4. I purchased this book based on the witty title and other reviews. I have been disappointed with the content, but that's probably because I have experienced an uneventful pregnancy. I found that I could not relate to the seemingly unending trials the author endured throughout her pregnancy. I do give the author credit for her funny moments and frank manner in her story telling. They gave me a chuckle every now and then. Overall, I found that the What to Expect series and The Modern Girl's Guide to Motherhood were much more informative and helpful.



5. I agree with most of the other reviewers - this book tells it like it is without being terribly crude or rude. There are some things mentioned that not every doctor will agree with (the risks of soft cheese, microwaves, hair dye, etc). However, early in the book, Kimes informs readers that doctors are different, just as all women are different. I enjoyed the empathy/sympathy about the fright of bleeding during pregnancy - especially if you've already had one (or more) miscarraige. I bought this book before my 1st miscarriage and just skimmed the part about bleeding and the fear of miscarriage. Then I had one and got pregnant again within 2 months. That pregnancy also ended in miscarriage. When I got pregnant the 3rd time, I read the section about bleeding during pregnancy being normal, but terribly scary for those who've suffered miscarraige. It reassured me that all women have some fear of miscarriage, but once you've been there, done that, your fear is greatly magnified! I'm in my 18th week now and still enjoying the book!

5 comments about Watercolor Painting Outside the Lines.

1. I believe this book is good for beginners as it instructs the reader on how to analyze pigments (transparent, staining and opaque)and how they will behave. Most beginners do not know about these pigment characteristics, so from that standpoint alone it is a good investment for your library. It also illustrates the right way to lay in a flat wash and build depth through "glazing". Many of the exercises are beneficial to the reader no matter what approach you will want to take to your own watercolor paintings.



2. Well-laid-out basic procedures. Two pages in the back which are truly useful checklists for planning and starting paintings. I am excited about applying this method to subjects I have painted in the past.



3. Linda's work is so bold and fresh it borders on the abstract. The approach is groundbreaking, and the resulting work is rich and fluid and inspiring.
   The book starts out with suggestions on materials and supplies. She then leads you through very simple exercises to teach the basics of understanding negative shapes. She also provides instruction on modifying shapes, composition strategies, and color. Then she leads you through more and more intricate layers. It's an entirely new way of thinking. I have used these techniques in my own work and with my college students as well. Artists at any level can benefit from her ideas.
   
   (I also took a workshop from her and highly recommend her as an instructor.)



4. This author takes watercolor to a useful and understandable technique for the person new to this media. Her directions are clear, consise and knowledgable. Her demonstrations, while challenging to duplicate, are easy to follow. I highly recommend her book to anyone seeking to widen their understanding of what watercolor can do for their art.



5. This is an original book that will expand your painting skills by providing you with techniques to approach painting through negative spaces. Everything is explained meticulously in step by step diagrams that leave nothing unclear. It is a valuable addition to painters who want to expand their repertoire of skills. However, the technique explained in this book, fascinating as it is, has its limitations, as it can only work in pictures where the negative spaces are darker than the positive ones (you will understand how and why when you read it). Should the painter want their negative spaces to be lighter in color than the shapes depicted, this technique would not work.
   
   Maybe it is a first step and the author, or somebody else, can expand the possibilities of this technique further; what we learn in this book is certainly not the last word on negative-space painting. The author explores mostly landscapes, and the results of her specific approach gives results that are highly original, but that have a specific eerie-spooky character. Since I haven't tried applying the technique yet, I cannot tell whether that eerie quality is an inevitable consequence of that technique, or is it the result of the author's/painter's specific choices, and whether a different painter could get results of a totally different quality.
   
   Despite these limitations, it is a very useful approach to get to know, especially for painters who do not just want to learn a new trick, but who also want to learn how to see in new ways. Highly recommended.