5 comments about Tiling 1-2-3 (Home Depot ... 1-2-3).

1. When I bought this book, I wanted to tile a countertop with porcelain. The book shows many visual examples of elaborate porcelain countertops in the opening pages. It lists the things you must consider when choosing tile for a project. So far, so good.
   
   Sadly, the book only shows how to tile a certain type of red glazed ceramic countertop. Please show me how to do the rustic stone & porcelain countertops you put beautiful pictures of in the first chapter! This was a letdown.
   
   The countertop section needs to be fleshed out about 3x the length that it is now, with many different styles & methods of trimming. Show people how to trim the countertop edges with different types of bullnose, wood, decorative pieces, v-cap trim, etc. Also show how to undermount sinks with quarter rounds of tile. (See Taunton's book, "Tiling Complete") These are the things people are thinking of when they want to tile a countertop, and the book just doesn't deliver.
   
   I didn't spend much time looking at the floor & wall & ad-hoc project sections of the book. These may be adequate for most people's needs, but I'm not sure.



2. The book was expensive but I did learn a few things. Be careful about following the instructions on shower pan construction. I'm not an expert, but after reading many books on tiling, I do believe it is important to pre-slope the pan membrane to the drain and to not puncture the membrane on top of the curb with screws (it's better to do the curb with lath and mortar, not by screwing on cement board). John Bridge's site is a good all-around source on this subject inhabited by both DIY'ers and real pros.



3. I bought this book at Home Depot and returned it after a few hours upon finishing it. I could have got the same information from a free pamphlet. They ought to be ashamed. However, there were some nice pictures and I did learn a little bit, but it was just a super easy primer for the real thing. I didn't buy another book before tiling 900sf in my house. I wish I had bought a better book, as I learned all kinds of tricks "the hard way." Hint: Swimming after tiling all day can return your back to normal when it doesn't seem like anything else will help. I am now going to buy John Bridge's book before my next tiling job.



4. This is a good book for people who want to start tiling or for people who have stated but would like to get more ideas, help or tricks.



5. This book is more or less useless on it's own. It tries to make tiling look really simple and straightforward. Tiling is actually not rocket science at all, but you really do need to spend time up front deciding what you are going to do. It isn't a weekend project. Get a real book written by someone who actually lays tile professionally and not just by people who sell the latest half-baked do it yourself supplies. I recommend "Tile Your Word" or "Setting Tile". Both top notch books. In fact, get both - given how expensive tile is it'll be worth the money.
   
   This book does have some nice pictures of some steps though. That's about all I can recommend it for.

No comments about Design For Kids.

3 comments about The Royal Palaces of Tudor England: Architecture and Court Life, 1460-1547 (Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in Britis).

1. This book is very extensive on the history of the Tudor palaces, it has great information and great pictures. A must buy for your collection of Tudor history.



2. I grew up in England and have visited many historical buildings from the Tudor period. If you are fascinated by the Tudor dynasty, especially Henry VIII, and the buildings and living conditions of the Tudor monarchs, this book will satisfy your thirst for knowledge. I thought that I had a fairly good knowledge about the Tudor period until I bought this book. Simon Thurley is an expert in this field and it shows. The book contains maps of the palaces, pictures of parts of excavated palaces that I have never seen before, and many, many paintings of the palaces how they "used to look". Many of these fine buildings have been lost to modernization and demolishment, but their images live on in this book. Excellent job Dr. Thurley!!



3. Dr. Thurley has done a great job with this reference book. A great addition to anyone's personal reference library on Tudor history.

5 comments about Bauhaus (World of Art).

1. Frank Whitford provides an essential introduction to the Bauhaus in his book, titled simply--Bauhaus. Whitford follows the events of the school from a historical perspective starting with Walter Gropius' plan and motivation for the school, to its ultimate end in Dessau at the hand of the Nazis. Whitford also presents personal perspectives through the journal entries and personal letters of the staff and students of the Bauhaus. These personal accounts help create a connection between the historical and the personal, and track the change in mood within the school. Whitford's book spends very little time on the impact of the Bauhaus, which is an analysis beyond the scope of this book. Frank Whitford's book, Bauhaus should be of interest to any student of art, design or education.
   
   Copyright © 2007 Of My Own Design, Josh Crain. All Rights Reserved.



2. This a great tribute to perhaps the most influential design institute of the 20th Century.
   The story of it's development, philosophy, success and untimely end is perfectly chronicled here.
   The expert, novice and vaguely interested would find this book useful. It's a superb acaedemic source and an important catalogue. Bauhaus still influences design today and should also be regarded historicaly as yet another victim of the Nazi regime.



3. Frank Whitford's Bauhaus in the Thames & Hudson World of Art series provides a fine basic introduction to the 20th century's most important school of art. Whitford writes engagingly and informatively. He begins by sketching the prehistory of the school in the 19th century arts-and-crafts movement and then goes on to examine van der Velde and the Weimar Art School that served as the basis upon which Gropius established the school. Whitford deals with all the major figures in the fourteen-year history of the Bauhaus and he uses contemporary documents (journals, personal accounts, etc.) to tell the story. I rank this among the best books in the Thames & Hudson series. In fact, I assigned it as a required text in a course on the Bauhaus and the Weimar Republic. Incidentally, teachers might be interested to know that Whitford has also written and narrated a fine 60" film "Bauhaus: Face of the 20th Century" (available in the Films for the Humanities series.)



4. Great background to an institution which was about as rock'n'roll as they come. The soul put into the establishment, its teachings, its beliefs (collective and individual) and the commitment of those involved is staggering - its a shame that it really doesn't have an equivalent today, but that's todays politic and media for you. Consice account that was almost written as a historical novel - Christ, I even read the bibliography at the end !! Off to find more books about it all now. Oh, and listen to Blumfeld, International Jetset & Earl Brutus whilst reading this too.

   AJC 1999




5. Mister Whitford thoroughly chronicled the events that formed and shaped the Bauhaus - from the very beginning to the unfortunate end. A very good point of view - a must read for the Bauhaus enthusiast.

5 comments about Green By Design.

1. This introductory guide to sustainable living will give you new ideas for building your home in an environmentally-friendly way.



2. I agree with Bill below - this book is outdated. The author seems to miss the concept of ecological footprint. The first two houses she features in her book are 3,300 sq ft (for three people) and 3,000 sq ft (for two people). Another house is 4,175 sq ft.
   
   Even if people use green materials and building practices, the houses aren't green if they're using excessive materials and space.
   
   There are a number of better green books, but one that specifically focuses on minimizing environmental impact is Little House on a Small Planet by Shay Salomon.



3. I am a SoCA tract homeowner getting ready to relocate to the mountains of northern Utah. My husband and I are committed to building a home that is environmentally responsible, but the "green" concept is absolutely overwhelming. Green by Design is a terrific overview of the concept of sustainable living. Through the several case studies we learned that we would not have to be locked into an ugly straw box or uglier geodesic dome, and this book gave us just what we needed for next steps. If you already have expertise in this area and are looking for a how-to, I'm sure there are more appropriate books to help you build your home. However, if you want an introduction, this book does a great job.



4. This book uses a lot of buzz words and offers very little substantial advice when it comes to actually designing your own house. It touches a little on straw bale and reused materials and barely grazes cob/clay/rammed earth. It doesn't even mention geodesic domes as far as I can tell. The book advocates on one page (p.72) that people should live in small humble buildings, only having the square footage they absolutely need. Then a few pages later (p.79) it shows a 4000+ sq. ft. home, with the title "an excersize in efficiency." I fail to see anything efficeint about a 4000 sq. ft. home, especially when it's a standard A-frame building (granted, it's for a family of 6, but then again there's nothing "green" about having 4 children).
   
   It does cover some good stuff like gray-water use, rain collection, alternative heating and cooling, but it glosses over all of this and takes up a lot of space with strange-angled shots of rooms and floor plans. I KNOW the floor plan I want, and there's very little that a floor plan has to do with green building (it's more about orientation to the sun for passive solar use). What I'd prefer to have seen was simple diagrams of how the systems of the house work. There's a spot that explains how one house has the pool hooked up to the AC such that the hot exhaust from the AC heats the pool. Now THAT's something I can get into, but I want more than a couple sentences about it. That deserves a diagram!



5. My 50's Florida ranch style home is in the design stage for major remodel. In the the first "case study" in Green by Design the owner's took a 50's style one bedroom home in Utah and incorporated the foundation and concrete masonry shell into the new design. Exactly my plan. The author uses 14 green design homes as case studies with wonderfully insightful pictures and just the right text to accompany the pictures and to explain "process", "design", "site", "materials", "space", "energy"- all concepts I can use to make my newly remodeled home a certifiable Florida Green Home.
   
   Building Green is NOT about the latest designs and materials as the previous reviewers would have you believe. It's about designing for "sustainable living". Go to floridagreenbuilding.org to find a 5 page checklist of features required to build a green home in Florida. Nothing will get you more points (other than a small home) in this 5 page checklist than not having a permament irrigation system. In fact not having a swimming pool, not living on a natural body of water and not having an attached garage all count toward living "green" in Florida. If you want an up-to-date and "exhaustive resource" buy the latest edition of the "Greenspec Directory"-$89.00 here on Amazon. However the last 5 pages of this book is a list of resources, including the Greenspec Directory and 5 local green building programs. With Florida's now you have 6.
   
   The ultimate green home is a SMALL HOME! In Florida, a 1000 sq. ft. home will get you 50 points (out of 200 required minimum for certification) and a 2000 and above sq. ft. home will get you 0 points. Over 50% of the case study homes in this book would have recieved extra points if they would have been built in Florida. Which brings me to the regional focus of this book. Most of the homes featured where located in western states ( a few were in the northeast) and normally that would disqualify most books for a Florida resident, but not in this case.
   
   I highly recommend this book if you are serious about designing a home for sustainable living.

4 comments about Roof Construction Manual, English Edition.

1. book in good shape and delivery is quick.
   
   amazon's sevice is at least 4 stars



2. I love the Edition DETAIL's series of Construction Manuals. These books have taken some of the examples from their wonderful magazines series but is much more comprehensive. It covers the history of the materials, construction methods, material properties, example of projects built recently (within the past 10 yrs) and drawings of the enlarged details precisely and clearly labled. The price is a bit steep but I believe the book is well worth the price because you'll have a hard time finding books like these (concentrated on details) on the market (if you did please share the titles with us). One drawback on books like these is there's a danger the construction methods and details demonstrated in the book could become outdated as the years pass on. Another thing I would like to point out particular to the Roof Construction Manual is the book only covers pitched roof (otherwise I would have given it five stars).



3. One in a series of indispensible DETAIL Construction Manuals, Roof Construction covers a broad range of roof types from modern built-up and tensile roofs to traditional shake and thatched roofs to green and solar roofs, with an excellent collection of detail drawings at 1:10 scale. The book is also packed with vital information regarding the history of roof types and fundamentals of roof construction, big and small. You can't go wrong in adding this book to your reference shelf.



4. I never would have guessed one could write a whole volume on pitched roofs, but, now that I've seen it, I see how specialized roof construction is. This being a European book, there's far more coverage of various types of roofs, with the asphalt shingles that are ubiquitous in the US being but one of many options. Even thatched roofs are covered. There's an extended section on structural requirements, and even a mention of historical methods, using hammer beams, for example. But it's the building science section that stands out. This is covered to some degree in all the books in the Construction Manual series, but the concepts of heat flow, moisture control, etc., are explained at great length here. Practical guidelines are given based on the European building codes, and construction details abound. The translation to British English (e.g. roof sarking) is well-done and the book design and paper quality are every bit as good as the excellent and highly technical content.

No comments about Electricity & Controls for HVAC-R.

3 comments about Studio at Large: Architecture in Service of Global Communities.

1. This is a great book for both those people who are interested in learning about or those people who are already familiar with environmentally friendly "green" building pratices used in sustainable architecture. Studio at Large specifically chronicles the achievements of the UW BASIC Initiative program that Sergio Palleroni and his colleagues created in 1995. It is fascinating and moving to see the impact this work has on the local and global levels in society.



2. Prof. Sergio Palleroni teaches the "art-and-science" of "architecture" the old fashion way--with leadership and passion! He's not affraid of rolling up his sleeves, soiling his boot and spending his summer vacations whith his students (the future leaders): teachong design, scheduling and building sustainable communities in the "developing countries."



3. Its good to see that the rural studios work is not unique but rather part of a movement, with other brilliant examples such as the work documented in this book. Beautifully illustrated. Probably the most in depth discussion I've read on the methods and challenges of work among the poor and underserved.
   A great contribution to architectures claim to relevance.

2 comments about Modern to Classic.

1. I do like this book, it's well put together and the photography is excellent. Not to take credit away from Mr Landry's talents, but the best part of the book is the descrptions of the homes in it by writer Lynn Morgan. She breathes life into the photographs and has the perfect voice for these homes: able not only to describe but inform. Sad that she is not being given the credit she is so clearly deserves....



2. If you are a fan of architecture or simply want a glimpse into how the rich and famous live, BUY THIS BOOK! Richard Landry does brilliant work and this book is an amazing showcase of his talent, innovation, and versatility. This book is chock full of the most spectacular houses you will ever see. The photography is simply magical. I can't reccomend this book enough. I'm buying several more copies as X-Mas presents!

1 comments about A Guide to Dry Stone Walling.

1. I give Andy Radford's book five stars, because now that I'm actually finished with months of off and on reading and I'm now down to actually building my stone walls, its his book (among half a dozen others), that I'm using for help.
   
   Mr. Radford's experience is entirely from Great Britain where he lives. This could have been a big problem, since he works in a different climate with different geology. There is a bit of history over there about stone walls, so perhaps this is why the author ably communicated universal techniques that span regional differencs in aesthetics and stone.
   
   Actually, the value I continue to get out of the book, despite the differences in geography and culture, probably result from Mr. Radford's experience as a teacher. His book (text, photos, step by step, and categorization by type of wall) follows a logical sequence specifically designed for the beginner.
   
   The only thing I smiled about was the front cover photo - of a wall that very much looks like it was a beginner's first effort! Like they say, don't just a book by its cover. Inside is everything you need to know about the fundamentals of dry stacking a nice stone wall in a variety of situations.