No comments about Mexican Interiors Current Trends/Interiores Mexicanos.

3 comments about Alternative Construction: Contemporary Natural Building Methods.

1. If you have read few other books on alternate construction this is a good book for a general survey of current trends in natural building. Some good pointers on where to go for more details.
   If you are looking for an actual how-to guide to various building methods, this book is not the one you want. Certainly not as a solo guide if you are looking to be an owner-builder in the sense of building yourself.
   Worth reading by checking it out from your library, not worth purchasing.



2. This is an excellent resource book for those seeking to learn more about alternative construction methods and materials. It introduces the reader to straw bale, cob, light straw clay (a marvelous material), rammed earth and many other ecologically appropriate materials. It doesn't provide enough detail to help you build with these materials but it will help you choose which might be good for you and guides you to some of the key people and resources. The chapter on natural conditioning of houses is outstanding and provides performance estimates for a variety of building materials in cities as diverse as Denver and El Centro.

   david bainbridge is one of the authors of the Straw Bale House and a pioneer in passive solar heating and cooling.




3. A good informativeand worth to keep in your personal library

2 comments about Florida Modern.

1. Jan Hochstim has clearly done a lot of research for this book and it will probably be regarded as the definitive study of the Modern house in Florida. As with many historical architectural studies it is obviously very visual but unfortunately the presentation of the copy and photos are pretty hopeless. Many of the pages give the impression that amateurs designed them.
   
   In the fascinating first chapter: The roots of Modernism, Hochstim explains that the advent of air conditioning more or less ended the run of Modernism in Florida. Admittedly there were not a huge number of Modern houses built since 1945 (and this book probably features the best of them) but those that were had to be designed to take advantage of the cooling breezes in the extreme heat and humidity for several months each year and don't forget the bugs. Another interesting challenge for the local architects was cost. Many of the houses in the book are small and to increase the apparent size extensive use of glass (adjustable for breeze control) brought the outside inside. Air conditioning finished these interesting design problems.
   
   The work of about forty architects is featured. They each get a brief introduction followed by photos and floor plans of their main work. It is these pages where I think the book goes seriously wrong. Frequently photos are completely obscured by white or black type. Floor plans have been reduced to mere decorative elements, made too small and appear in white on many photos. Hochstim writes very informative descriptions of the houses, frequently several hundred words long and amazingly many of these are presented as one long paragraph printed on an exterior photo of the house. All this is made even more annoying because the designers have left plenty of empty page space, either as white or colored panels.
   
   There are so many pages completely ruined by thoughtless design that I think the book is seriously flawed, which is unfortunate because if the words and photos had been handled professionally it could have looked really wonderful. These lovely homes certainly deserve better.
   
   ***FOR AN INSIDE LOOK click 'customer images' under the cover.
   
   
   



2. This book describes and illustrates almost a hundred homes built from 1945 to 1970 in Florida. The homes selected for this book represent the modern architecture that was developing in other parts of the country, especially California. The difference is that Florida architects were being influenced by other aspects such as Southern culture, the tropical vegetation found nearby, and aspects of cooling in the hot southern weathers. This resulted in more of an indoor-outdoor lifestyle than found in much of the rest of the country.
   
   The format of the book is broken down by the region in which the house is located and then by architect doing the design. In addition, the description of the houses is written by Mr. Hochstim. As a professor and a practicing architect he presents a much more interesting commentary than usually found. He often traces aspects of the design or construction techniques from one house to another illustrating how these techniques were developed and perfected.

2 comments about Dream Homes Metro New York (Dream Homes).

1. Panache Partners, the publishers of this book use as a tag line, 'Creators of Spectacular Publications for Discerning Readers.' And they have certainly fulfilled this goal in the publication of this book.
   
   Although the title of this book implies to me that the homes would be in New York City, the book really has a coverage that is more broad. Indeed it is broken down into five general areas: Manhattan & Westchester, Northern New Jersey, Southern Connecticut, Gold Coast of Long Island, and The Hamptons. The Hamptons, at roughly 80 miles from the city can be included because they are a traditional summer playground for the rich and famous of the city.
   
   Anyway, by stretching the geography just a bit, the editors have opened up a lot of territory to choose from. Lots of places on various waterfronts. Lots of places where a client with money (there are a lot of those in NYC) can build magnificant homes, truly 'Dream Homes.'
   
   The result of this is a book that is filles with beautiful full color pictures of a wide variety of homes that illustrate the range of architecture to be found in the area. It's a beautiful book.



2. THIS BOOK IS A GREAT BOOK FOR THE COFFEE TABLE. INTERESTING LITERATURE AND HELPFUL FOR THOSE WHO SEEK ARCHITECTURAL HOME'S

No comments about Rem Koolhaas and Cecil Balmond with Arup: Serpentine Gallery Pavilion 2006.

5 comments about Radiant Floor Heating.

1. This book is very comprehensive. The author explains just about everything you would need to know. However I would have enjoyed reading about solar applications in combination with what the author had to offer. Still, I would highly recommend this book to anyone wanting to install radiant floor heating. Book on solar heating do not provide the necessary details found here.



2. The author has a wealth of practical knowledge from years of experience in the field. I picked up much useful information from reading the text, but I also found myself reading the same information over and over again in different parts of the book! What I learned out weighed the annoyance of redundancies.



3. Really not much info in this for it's size. It's the type of book
   someone would get if they wanted to get radiant heating, didn't
   know anything about it, and were going to hire a contractor to
   put it in. This way, they could at least use the right words
   describing things.
   
   Surprisingly, it's the only book 2 local bookstores had in
   stock on radiant heating.
   
   Modern Hydronic Heating by Siegenthaler had much more info, background,
   designs, etc.



4. most complete i have ever read on radiant heat simple enough for someone like me new to radiant floor heat.but very complete has info for figuring size of pumps needed and number of loops etc



5. McGraw-Hill should be ashamed of themselves for allowing this book to be published! It meets none of the advertized criteria, and you couldn't begin to attempt a design or purchase after having read this thinly disguised manufacturer's sales pitch. There's better information available on the web for free. What's more the writing style is extremely superficial and repetitive, with identical illustrations used in numerous places simply as fillers. The author (if really an actual person) should go into hiding immediately.
   The publisher's "text book" reputation really deserves to be tarnished if this is the best they can come up with.
   Do not buy this book!

1 comments about Sacred Architecture.

1. Being an architect, I didn't think twice before buying this book and I am glad I didn't. The paper quality and printing alone are worth the price and anything beyond that is pure joy.
   
   This book works at many levels for those who have always sought meaning behind the relation between religion and astronomy and their translation into architecture. Besides exploring physical elements like geography, color, texture, material, the book also deals with space, smell, sound and realms.
   
   It voices the need of humans to connect with the divine and is a rich tribute to the ancient cultures of the world. It explores the practice of religion and significance attached to symbols, and very candidly explain the need for the preservation of beliefs for posterity through the use of a common language called architecture.

No comments about The Log Home: Classic Log Cabins Of North America.

2 comments about The International Style.

1. The most interesting aspect of the new edition is the recent forward by Philip Johnson (1995). In it he humorously describes his relationship with "The International Style," and how dated the book now appears. He also notes that it was Alfred Barr who introduced Hitchcock and him to this new world of architecture. It was Barr who had written extensively on the subject and dubbed it an "International Style."

   Not surprisingly, nearly all the buildings included in this catalog for the 1932 MoMA exhibit date from 1927. This was a pivotal year in the Modern Movement. Le Corbusier's "Toward a New Architecture" first appeared in English. The new improved Bauhaus opened its doors in Dessau, in Gropius' newly constructed complex. The International Competition for the League of Nations building was held with Le Corbusier losing out on a technicality. A building exhibition, laid out by Mies van der Rohe, was sponsored by the Deutscher Werkbund in Stuttgart. Modern Architecture had come of age.

   The selections are interesting for their range of architects but have several notable omissions. Among them Rudolf Schindler, who dismissed the idea of an "International Style," in a letter to Johnson. Modern architects then and now hate the idea of a "style," believing their works to be based on a set of constructive and compositional principles which transcend the notion of style.

   Nevertheless, the name stuck. Hitchcock and Johnson are widely credited for bringing the International Style to America, even though some early works by Neutra, Hood, Howe and Lescaze were included in the exhibition. Most importantly, Johnson lured Mies to America, where he would achieve his most lofty aspirations. The book makes for an interesting read but has long been superceded by more insightful and penetrating books on the subject.




2. This book is a living proof that architecture is an evolving being. It never stays stagnant. What is deemed to be modern then has now become a foundation for new styles & new materials to be developed to serve the functions & purposes of the occupants. Whilst the book defined the 3 principles that formed the backbone of the International Style, it's doing so as a mean of helping people to understand the 'style'better. Architects know better that there aren't any form of '-ism' but just good architecture when all the criterions of their clients are met. Half of the book is devoted to photos of buildings applying the so-called International Style but after you've seen one, you've seen it all. They all look distinctively indifferent to one another.

1 comments about Row Houses: A Housing Typology.

1. This is an excellent piece of research on the all pervasive housing type; the rowhouse. It is not an historical overview; it is a series of speculative projects, some student projects, with beautifully realized works of architecture as well. They point towards certain areas of research, into new possibiities of the type; spatial and subdivision innovations, interesting responses to topography, accommodation of parking, and different levels of interaction with the street. Highly recommended.