2 comments about Cabins of Minnesota (Minnesota Byways).

1. The pictures are like something out of a dream, or a very old memory, tantalizing glimpses that one wants to attend more closely. I studied the pictures, each one a little fantasy, and turned the page hoping to see more specifics, but instead found another dreamy fragment. The text is similarly meandering, taking a leisurely pace through the idyll of cabin life.
   
   I gave the book only 3 stars not because there's anything subpar about what's in it, but because what's in it only skimmed the surface of my interest in cabins. I wanted more technical information. I wanted floorplans or demographical statistics.



2. The beautiful scenery of a MN cabin on a MN lake!
   "Wow!"
   
   Breath taking!
   
   Mark Salinas, MN

5 comments about Weekend Utopia: Modern Living in the Hamptons.

1. Finally got the chance to sit and read Gordon's excellent text in Weekend Utopia. The book goes way beyond an illustrated coffee book. Gordon manages to weave together stories about the characters who shaped the place (like developer Carl Fisher who created Montauk to be the "Miami Beach of the North")with stories about the flamboyant architecture, post-war artists like Pollock and Motherwell and his own personal memories as a boy spending summers there. While the book has a large format with hundreds of illustrations it is most readable and explains so much about how a rural American landscape was transformed into a resort for show-offs. I loved it and can't comprehend what reviewers from Hong Kong and the Netherlands were talking about. It is neither trying to be a professional book on architecture nor a cheap gossip book about pseudo-celebrities. It is an intelligent cultural history that also happens to be well designed and illustrated. It warmed my soul on a chilly winter weekend and made me want to go to the beach as soon as possible.



2. Wonderfully written and researched. Architecturally lacking photographs, drawings, or any substance for inspiration or idea generation. Cover and size of book suggests more pictorial content, but fails to deliver.



3. When i saw the cover of this book i thought this would be a great book. I wanted to find pictures of beautiful decorated houses,nice gardens and offcourse the habitants of the mansions. Well, that's not quite what's inside this book. For the most only pictures of houses taken in the 50's and 60's and a lot of text!! I want pictures of Aerin Lauder and the Miller sisters!!



4. I'm a bit mystified by the comments below that seem to implicate this book and its author in what the Hamptons have become. To the contrary, Weekend Utopia celebrates happier days pre-mega mansions: when culture and architecture and some fascinating characters created some truly exceptional houses, most of them modest in scale. In fact, today's Hamptons home-builders could learn a lesson or two from this book (like small can be very beautiful), and stop the further despoilment of what the Hamptons used to be: something Weekend Utopia shows with great clarity and style. This wonderful book is certainly no apologia for the mess that awaits you at the end of I-495...



5. I agree with the reviewer who said that the Hamptons were ruined long ago -- by the very succession of waves of development that this book touts. I do love looking at some of the quality design of the past that this book shows, but the new reality is overbuilding and, even worse, tasteless building. The feeling of getting away to a charming, easy-going, and low-key place with rural roots is gone forever in the Hamptons. We left because of the continuing intrusion of the nouveau riche who are more interested in showing off than in quietly relaxing-----peoplewho have now made the Hamptons a decidedly UNCOOL place to be.

4 comments about Casa Yucatan.

1. I love architecture and interior design and am currently in the process of designing a home thirty miles south of Cancun. In working with an architect from France and the relevant language issues (French, Spanish and English) I needed a starting point to state my ideas of what I wanted to design. I have many other books such as Casa California but needed something with specific architecture in the Yucatan Peninsula.
   
   After our original drawings I bought this book. My architect laughed at our next visit as he had the same book with much more wear on it. His other clients had been using it to describe thoughts and just referring to page numbers. In my case our ideas were established prior to discovering this book. But the book allowed me to visualize many of the ideas incorporated by our architect. The pictures are beautiful and the author does a great job providing a historical perspective on the styles. My architect said it is worth planning a trip to view many of the homes in the book and I hope to do so in the future. My compliments to the author for successfully capturing the culture of this unique area of Mexico.
   
   In the next year I hope to buy authentic Mexican furniture. I have heard in Guadalajara there are places to buy this furniture prior to massive mark-ups through distribution. Please email me if you know of any ideas on where I should consider shopping and also if there are internet sites to view, [...].



2. We wish we had known about and read Casa Yucatán, before we had our wonderful three-week vacation in the Yucatán, in August/September, 2002. If you're planning to go to the Yucatán, be sure to take Casa Yucatán with you. We discovered (and stayed at)three of the marvellous hacienda hotels: the Temozón, Santa Rosa and San José. Each one has unique architecture, adapted from its original use with panache and refined good taste. When we saw them in the book, it was like re-visiting them. Our appetite was whetted to try to see more of the beautifully-photographed and knowledgeably-described homes on our next visit. At the back of the book, there's a 4-page Travel Guide, filled with useful information. Mexican design is beautiful and probably no non-Mexicans know more about it than Karen and Joe, having dedicated decades to studying it seriously and having visited and photographed many outstanding examples for inclusion in their books. One place we'll be sure not to miss is Hacienda Petac, the restoration of which was just completed in December 2002. Karen and Joe are partners in that enterprise, the design center of which offers a showcase for Mexican antiques, architectural elements and decorative accents. Hacienda Petac also offers accomodations to guests. We would hope that some of the architects whose projects are featured in Casa Yucatán and whose names addresses, phone numbers and e-mail addresses are shown, might be willing to arrange with the owners for interested readers to visit their beautiful homes.



3. This is another marvelous book on Mexican & Spanish Architecture, furnishings, & landscaping. The colors & textures used are exceptional. The lush landscaping is something we are trying to recreate in our our home.

   This book & their others have inspired us to do some very creative things with our desert property.




4. Casa Yucatan is yet another example of the brilliance of this creative duo who inspire and educate. Makes one want to leave manaña por la manaña for the beautiful Yucatan Peninsula. I have all five books they have written and am anxiously awaiting the relase of their sixth entitled "Mexican Details".

1 comments about Rome.

1. Too many histories jump lightly and quickly from the grandeur of pagan Rome to the grandeur of Renaissance and Baroque Rome --ignoring the thousand year artistic and architectural history in between. This book fills in a long and fascinating gap in the history; and brings to our attention works of art that, if they are outshone by the splendours before and after, are not to be despised. The only problem with this book is the relative paucity of pictures and plans, and the absence of any in colour. If printing photographs or reproductions is expensive, why can't they provide a DVD to go with the book?

3 comments about Plantation Homes of Louisiana and the Natchez Area.

1. This was purchased as a Christmas gift for my son-in-law who is originally from Louisiana. He loves it. From the narrative history to the beautiful pictures.



2. First of all, I love the South, and love plantation homes. The photographs in this book are very good. I personally didn't enjoy the photos of the rundown and derelict plantations. I bought this book because I thought it contained BEAUTIFUL pictures of the finest homes. And most of them are very nice, BUT...First of all, this is a pricey book.I once had a slim volume offerred by the Travel bureau that was better than this book. If all you want is to have a pretty coffee table book, it's fine. I personally would have preferred they leave out the aerial photos high above the homes...and the photos of derelict, rundown plantations and included more interior shots or different angles of the really beautiful plantations. I found that I looked through it once, but will probably rarely look through it again. Though it is well done for what it is, when reading the reviews before purchasing, I had a different impression of what this book is.



3. This book just takes your breath away. The houses are so beautiful and the photographs so vivid. Louisiana is perhaps the most blessed with homes from the old south and this book does them such a great service. It's nothing short of amazing that so many of them have survived, it's a testement to the quality of the builders, mostly slaves, the cypress wood used so often and benign neglect. Thank God these wonderful homes where not burned during the Civil War or torn down by short sighted developers. It's really lucky for us that this part of Louisiana has been virtually asleep for 150 years, but in the last 30 years it has awaken like a Pheonix and these houses have been restored and cared for, I am so grateful to Mr. Gleason for having created this book and for the preservationists that saved the homes themselves. I have visited many of these grand plantations and you can't help but be in awe of the beauty and saddened at the same time about the cruel institution that created them. I most appreciate the homes that have maintained their slave quarters, everyone should have to see the way these people lived, it was not all zippidy do da zippidy aye, I assure you...one must always view the historic south through this prism to understand the struggle to overcome. I highly recommend this book to anyone with a love for all things beautiful.

1 comments about Themes and Variations: House Design: Ray Kappe: Architects/Planners (House Design, 3).

1. Here's the book review from The New York Times:

   "With the revival of interest in post-World War II Los Angeles architecture, coupled with a fascination for today's West Coast architects, book publishers have been working furiously to meet the demand....

   "[The book Themes and Variations: Ray Kappe has] arrived in this country from Images Publishing in Australia...by Michael Webb, on the architect Ray Kappe, heir to the California modernist tradition. Known to most as the founder of the experimental SCI-Arc school (Southern California Institute of Architecture), Mr. Kappe is also one of the most undersung architects in Los Angeles. He began his career in the early 50's and wedded the open spaces of Richard Neutra to the softer, more natural modernism of Harwell Hamilton Harris. Then he added the complexity and love of landscape of Frank Lloyd Wright. Eleven of Mr. Kappe's projects are displayed in this long overdue monograph. Included is his own, breathtaking 1965 Kappe House in Pacific Palisades, a marvel of interlocking planes of wood, glass and concrete in harmony with a lush canyon site. His works are so three-dimensional that photos do not always do them justice." (New York Times, March 18, 1999)

5 comments about City Life.

1. Rybczynski has compiled an excellent commentary on urban America and why it looks and functions the way it does. It is required reading for my graduate students. I hardily recommend it for anyone interested in the history, state and future of our cities.



2. I picked this book up out in Portland, Oregon. Out there for a conference, this was my first time in Portland. The city sat like a gem in my mind for years, a northwest Mecca of pleasant living and educated population. When my boss told me we needed to attend a conference there, for once I didn't gripe. But somehow, the city disappointed me, in much the same way this book did. Both held out an intriguing promise and both fell short, not from lack of expertise, but from good intentions.
   
   I've read two other books by Mr. Rybczyncki, "Looking Around" and "The Look of Architecture". Both were fine reads, written and littered with pleasant insight. The same can be said of "City Life".
   
   Rybczyncki obviously knows what he's talking about. And I think that's ultimately his problem. He sticks to what he knows. The book is clean, scrubbed of the messiness that makes cities so interesting. There aren't even any diagrams or illustrations. Instead he briskly walks you through the history of the American city in 200 pages. One of the reviewers here said he read this book for a high school history class. That seems about right. Facts and trends are revealed, but only one idea surfaces. In some ways this primacy of focus must be commended. The information is conveyed clearly and concisely. Rybczynski runs no risk of being called out on a theory that might prove wrong. The closet he treads to controversy is admitting a fondness for the mall.
   
   Outlandish theories need not be the goal. But there the book offer so little to disagree with you almost feel like you didn't learn anything. It seems Rybczyncki with his gentile sensibility, has no wish to offend.
   
   Portland's all clean lines, small blocks and mixed usage. The perfect city. Walkable and drivable. As I was strolling around, wasting time I should have been spending at the conference, the city tried to seduce me. Climbing the hills into the Rose Garden, I actually heard the city whisper to me, "Move here. Move here. Look around you. How nice is this? Leave dirty, loud New York. You can live here. You can be upper middle class too; drive an SUV Volvo, live in a pretty wood house painted dark green, go running in the hills, shop at the organic farmers market." My stomach warmed over the fantasy, as if I just drank a full glass of warm water. It seemed life would have no problems, if I lived in Portland. I would forget about Lisa; my career would trundle along; I would go to more dinner parties. Everything had been thought out. And that would kind of suck. Plus, I remembered: I hate driving, I don't run and I never cook. But the city plan is good.
   
   And somehow "City Life" reminds me of this feeling. The prose whisks you along, laying facts before you. I actually underlined quite a bit. But then I got to the last twenty pages, realized there's not much left and asked, "That's it?"
   
   I met a city planner out in Portland who extolled to me, "Portland has more jazz clubs than any other city in the U.S. other than New York." Which made me think, jazz may be dead.



3. This book attempts to answer the question-an important one to my thinking-"Why don't our cities look like the great ones: Paris, Rome?" Rybczynski, a student of architecture and city planning discusses the history of American blunders from the highway to the skyscraper, from the "City Beautiful" movement, to the negro rush toward city centers in the late 60's. It seems that everything that could've gone wrong, essentially has. Still, the author sees hope in the forms of a few master-planned towns (east coast), and of the modern suburban mall, which he sees as a place for people to gather and do commerce, while feeling safer than they would in urban areas due to the malls' governing rules and aesthetic uniformities which have been abolished in the name of individual freedoms elsewhere, to our peril.



4. The back cover contains a quote from Wall Street Journal reviewer Roger Starr, stating that CITY LIFE by Witold Rybczynski is a "fascinating investigation of what cities - especially modern cities - should be like." This isn't strictly true. It's an investigation all right, but one more focused on what modern cities actually are and how they came to be that way, than a manifesto about the way things ought to be. A lot of history is covered, from brief mentions of the earlier dwellings of the Native Americans to the complexities inherent in our modern metropolises.

   The book focuses mostly upon the development of cities in the United States and Canada. European cities are occasionally mentioned and discussed, but only in how they compare to their North American cousins. It's a history of cities, which combines modern-day thoughts on their development as well as some historical comments from what the people of the time thought of how their cities were emerging. Rybczynski also manages to touch on the roles of commercialism, art, and the unique qualities of North America that have helped to define our cities. Cities did not spring fully-formed, nor were they all laid out at the same time, and the author takes time to explore how different approaches to city planning created vastly differing results. He compares the many different approaches, from the organized and structured to the evolving and improvised.

   The absolute biggest flaw with this text is that it is indeed just a text. Outside of the cover (featuring a sketching of a 19th Century street-scene and a poignant pre-9/11 photograph of the New York City skyline), there are no illustrations. No pictures, no diagrams, no maps, no charts, no blueprints, no photos -- nothing. Like Alice, I couldn't understand why someone would write a book such as this without including pictures. Rybczynski, therefore, spends far too much time describing city layouts, maps, street diagrams and other visual artifacts, leaving the reader without a pictorial aid. Photographs and maps are described rather than included. It's very frustrating. A picture is worth a thousand words, and in a book that is this heavily involved concerned with what things look like, some pictures would have been invaluable.

   Rybczynski's writing style is relatively engaging, though he does have an unfortunate tendency to lapse into dry lists of various items (usually one word mentions of various architects and city planners). This can be infrequently distracting, leading one to wonder if perhaps some of the information could have been conveyed in a more interesting way. Still, the history of cities as well as the philosophy behind their growth makes for fascinating subjects, so whatever faults may lie in the book, it is still well worth reading.




5. Anyone who's ever given half a thought to the influences which shaped American cities could have written this book. Rybczynski only brings a pedantic specificity and inane pseudo-historical perspective. It all really falls apart when he trots out de Toqueville. Don't bother reading it. And for God's sake don't waste your money on buying a copy.

No comments about Advanced Building Systems: A Technical Guide for Architects and Engineers.

No comments about Best Designed Wellness Hotels: North And South America, Carribean, Mexico / Nord - Und sudamerika, Karibik, Mexiko (Best Designed).

No comments about The Danteum.