1 comments about Black & Decker Stonework & Masonry Projects: New Projects in Stone, Brick & Concrete (Black & Decker).

1. This book is designed for the suburban home owner with access to a 'warehouse' style hardware store. It covers the tools available at your hardware store and how to use them for your masonry projects. A variety of projects are outlined, with an emphasis on poured concrete and purchased blocks (cinder-blocks, bricks, etc). The book is filled with color photos and each project includes a step-by-step construction details. There are many, many useful construction tips.
   
   These are beginner projects, so the book isn't designed to inspire the inner-artist.
   
   Table of Contents:
   Introduction:
   Planning
   Estimating and ordering materials
   Masonry tools and equipment
   working safe
   Masonry Techniques:
   Working with Masonry Fasteners
   Working with Concrete
   Working with Stone
   Working with Brick and Block
   Masonry Projects:
   Walks, Paths and Steps
   Walls, Pillars & Arches
   Finishing Hourse and Garden Walls
   Building Landscape Accents

2 comments about Building With Earth: A Guide to Flexible-Form Earthbag Construction (A Real Goods Solar Living Book).

1. I have been casting about for alternative housing ideas for a few years now and have read several books concerning building your own. This book covers, not in great depth, several related building techniques that are valuable for those of us interested in other than stick (wood) construction. I highly recommend this book as a good starting point to those who prefer NOT to pound nails in wood!



2. Of the few books on earth shelter in circulation, Bill, Athena, and Paulina have provided us with a Gaudian Prairie style home for today. The experience of reading this book is like getting to the roots of our earthly existance in regards to needs and desires. All we need is shelter, made from the earth, with the help of the community.

No comments about Chinese Architecture and Planning: Ideas, Methods, Techniques.

No comments about On These Walls: Inscriptions & Quotations in the Library of Congress.

No comments about Modern Retro: Living With Mid-century Modern Style.

No comments about The Seattle Bungalow: People And Houses, 1900-1940 (A Samuel and Althea Stroum Book).

No comments about R 128 by Werner Sobek.

1 comments about The Mighty Fallen: Our Nation's Greatest War Memorials.

1. A wonderful book, although by no means definitive. It includes wonderful photography of many of the U.S. military's most important monuments (as well as some Canadian ones). The only fault I see with the book is that almost all of the monuments are on the East Coast, whereas there are many significant monuments at military posts in the west which should have been included.

1 comments about The Environmental Imagination.

1. College-level readers of architecture or environmental design will find this a fine history which uses themes and a chronological arrangement from the 18th century to modern times to survey the history of environmental design. While The Environmental Imagination: Technics and Poetics of the Architectural Environment could have also been featured in our Arts section, it's reviewed here for its wider applications to any college-level holding strong on poetics and environment: essays consider qualitative dimensions of the environment and both old and new technologies of mechanical services, building design choices, and diversity.

1 comments about Mies van der Rohe - IIT Campus: Illinois Institute of Technology.

1. This is a nice book deadicaqted strickly to the IIT campus. It gives a brief history and understanding of the campus and its buildings. The black and white photos are compeling and are the focus of the book. It is a great and fast recource for a general understanding of this campus. I wish it had been longer and had more text is all i can really say bad about it.