2 comments about Thinking Architecture.

1. Reading this book was like reading a long-lost secret manual of
   "How to become a 21 century Samurai..." I guess that sense of delusion rises because the content and the tone of book has this (quasi) idea of medieval perfection achieved through a repetition of hands-on practice. "I do not work towards architecture from a theoretically defined point of departure, for I am committed to making architecture,," writes Zumthor.
   
   Moreover, a reader, at the back of her/his head, has those powerful images of Bath House in Vaals (tour de force of phenomenological experience) that intensifies the delusion. One would think, 'Zumthor must be a man from Mars to build architecture like that' and 'his writings must be a strong sleeping pill.' Usual Suspect !
   
   He writes extremely clear with extremely simple terms. This slim book tells us how an architect of such originality thinks and experiences daily life. It's a great pleasure to find out what kind of music (Mozart's piano concertos) zumthor listens; what kind of artists (Beuys and Merz) he likes; what kind of film he watches (Ettore Scola's film Le Bal); what kind of books (Calvino) he reads; and what kind of sayings ("the hard core beauty") in the radio show captivates him. A former cabinet maker, his book is carefully jointed, just like his buildings. Anyone who found this book fun/inspiring to read should also try Alvaro Siza's "Writings on Architecture"



2. A thoroughly engaging book about meaningful architecture - it now holds a very special place in my architecture library, right next to Michael Benedikt's For An Architecture of Reality.
   Excellent for anyone interested in Peter Zumthor's work.

2 comments about Jean-Michel Frank: The Strange and Subtle Luxury of the Parisian Haute-Monde in the Art Deco Period.

1. The contributions of Jean-Michel Frank to modern interiors are timeless and compelling. He created a sense of spaciousness and luxury in Paris apartments that was pure genius. Not much was known about this designer and his too-brief career; this book is a wonderful exploration of the man and his creation of interiors and furnishings. Great photos too.



2. Wonderful detailed photos and knowledgable time line for the great designers work and designs. Many photos of the shop in paris and how the rooms are put together.
   Great resource book.

2 comments about Green Building A to Z: Understanding the Language of Green Building.

1. As a national trainer and a former national board member of the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC), Jerry Yudelson is a nationally recognized leader and expert in green building. He summarized his many years of professional experience with green building design and renewable energy systems in "Green Building A to Z: Understanding the Language of Green Building."
   
   "Green Building A to Z: Understanding the Language of Green Building" covers the history, importance, benefits and costs of green building. It also covers some key elements of the LEED building rating system in plain English, such as water conservation, reducing energy use, solar energy, locally sourced materials, natural ventilation, zero-net-energy buildings and creating a conservation economy, etc.
   
   "Green Building A to Z: Understanding the Language of Green Building" has 240 pages packed with useful information. It is an indispensible and accurate guide for anyone who is interested in green building!



2. 
   I've always respected Jerry Yudelson. He is a fixture at USGBC and an active proponent of intelligent green building. Jerry has done the industry a service by writing his book.
   
   This book provides one page on each term so people new to the industry can follow conversations about sustainable architecture and urban planning. It decodes green building terminology. I recommend it for first year architect students or any old AIA dog trying to learn new tricks.
   
   It is even a good title for people who think they know it all, just to make sure they didn't miss anything.
   Sometimes we tend to know concepts so well that we can't explain the simplest of terms, A to Z saves the day.
   
   The appendix provides a great list of books and websites. For anyone wanting to shorten their learning curve (like the Regents of Higher Education perhaps?? or city commissioners??) this book is an easy one to flip through and is comprehensive enough to save hours and hours of fumbling around on Google. It is sort of like an abbreviated wikipedia of green building terms.
   
   -Jane Talkington
   PhD Student of Sustainability at OSU
   www.Trifecta-Consulting.com

5 comments about Bungalow Style: Creating Classic Interiors in Your Arts and Crafts Home.

1. My wife and I appreciated this detailed book and incorporated many ideas we found in our new (old) residence



2. I was very excited to get this book as we plan to incorporate some craftsman style elements into the 1970s bungalo we're buying. The interiors in the photos were not terribly attractive and leaned towards kitschy. Unless you want to turn you house into a museum to 20th century cheasiness, don't buy this book.



3. This is a good book if you are looking at remodeling a craftman type home or if you are planning to build one. I did like some of the idea's and the pictures.



4. If you are planning any kind work where you are going using allot of wood this is a great book, it is full of ideas. The photos have great detail. One of best books I have on Craftsman/Arts& Crafts interiors.



5. So you've bought a bungalow--now, what do you do with it? Maybe it's a fixer-upper; maybe it's too small, or doesn't have enough storage space; maybe you're just not sure what kind of furniture to get. This book is a great start toward deciding where to go next. Illustrated with hundreds of full-color photographs, it shows not only many of the features by which you can tell an Arts & Crafts house when you see it (I was surprised to learn that the big old foursquares such as my grandparents lived in for 40 years are included in this classification), but gives actual ideas carried out by other homeowners, even unto before-and-after floor plans. The author's advice is thoughtful and well suited to the houses she writes about, too. And if you just like to look at pictures of vintage American homes, this would be a good volume to add to your collection.

5 comments about The New Ecological Home: A Complete Guide to Green Building Options (Chelsea Green Guides for Homeowners).

1. Having been the first of it's kind I have read, this book is well-organized and readable. It seems good for the person brainstorming on what steps to take in the design of their eco-home. For more specific information to carry out the tasks, I would suggest other resources.



2. This book could very easily serve as a textbook for a green building course. It's not a coffee table book - the photos are small, and black and white - but very useful in supporting the text. This is a serious book about alternative building written by and about a group of people who have been creatively, responsibly, thoughtfully building for a very long time. It's a good choice for builders who want to learn more about sustainability, students who want to go into the field, or homeowners who are looking to build. It's not so much glitzy and inspirational as it is informative and useful: comprehensive from site selection and design through building options and techniques, to landscaping, it also contains a great resource guide.



3. During the planning phase of building our first home, this book was very helpful. We liked the emphasis right at the start on site selection -- what to look for in everything from the overall community to aspects of the land itself and how to environmentally protect that land during construction. A comparison checklist for assessing lots is included. Even though ours will not be a "natural House" (rammed earth, straw bale, etc.) and though those types of construction are covered, there was plenty of solid information on building a more energy efficient, and less wasteful, home of wood and concrete. Also included are chapters on design, using green and non- or less toxic materials, sustainable approaches to water and waste, environmental landscaping, and enery-efficient design, heating, and cooling. As this will be a retirement home, we especially appreciated the chapter on accessiblilty and ergonomic design.



4. Author Dan Chiras has produced a series of amazing books on green building, including The Natural House, The Solar House, Superbia!, and The Natural Plaster Book. His books are extremely well written, well organized, comprehensive, and extremely well illustrated. He's truly one of the best, if not the best, writer in the green building field.
   
   The New Ecological Home is no exception. In fact, I think it is one of the best books he has written. Although the cover is pretty drab, the book is a beauty inside. The book is engaging, easy to read, and full of interesting and helpful information that will assist those who want to explore the many options for building homes that are good for people, the planet, and the economy. This book should be read by all who are considering building a new home as well as those who are thinking about remodeling their homes. It is also a valuable resource for architects, builders, and students of architecture. Adding to its value, this book has a detailed resource guide that adds considerably to its value.



5. This book was a little bit hard to understand, especially if you are not knowledgable on the subject. I would recommend something more clear and easier to read.

1 comments about Living Systems: Innovative Materials and Technologies for Landscape Architecture.

1. As the former Director of Material Research at Material ConneXion, Liat Margolis combined her many years of experience in innovative multi-industry materials research with the professional design experience of her co-author and fellow Harvard GSD graduate, Alexander Robinson in "Living Systems: Innovative Materials and Technologies for Landscape Architecture."
   
   "Vertical landscapes also represent a conceptual shift toward a synthesis between landscape and architecture; building facades, for example, can be embedded within emergent, active and responsive skins..." Liat Margolis and Alexander Robinson wrote.
   
   They continued to discuss various living systems and applications demonstrated with real examples, including:
   
   Launch (Multi-tiered Vine Park, Misting Vine Pergola, Wind Adapted Road Canopy Structure, Fire-Escape Ecosystem, Parasitic Vegetal Structure)
   
   Stratify (Mechanically Stabilized Landform, Floating Glass Plain, Multi-Operational Modular Surface, Gradient of Resilience, Surface Inversion)
   
   Fluid (Weaving Porous and Non- porous Surfaces, Inflatable Dam System, Stormwater Garden, Drop Structures for Suburban Stormwater System, Networked Sidewalk Stormwater System, Bio-technical Wave and Erosion Control Structures)
   
   Grooming (Tree Crutches Growing Guide, Artificial Winter for a Bamboo Garden, Saltwater Herbicide System, Low-Maintenance Perennial Plantings, Stunted Growth Pattern)
   
   Digestive (Bio-Remediation Park Design, Fluvially Integrated Effluent Wetlands, On-site Sewage Treatment System, Ground Reconstitution Strategy, Strategic Contaminated Soil Placement)
   
   Translate (Pheumatic Body, Power by Wind, the Ground is a Turntable, Weather Informed Park Access System, Fiber Optic Marsh)
   
   Volatile (Responsive Cloud Machine, Computer Animated Rain, Dynamic Thermal Wind Wall, Impression of Rain).
   
   There is a helpful list of products and technologies at the end of the book.
   
   "Living Systems: Innovative Materials and Technologies for Landscape Architecture" has 191 pages and many color interior photos and illustrations. It is a good reference book for both design major students and seasoned professional designers.
   
   Gang Chen, LEED AP, AIA
   Author of "Planting Design Illustrated"

1 comments about Homes & Courtyards: 28 Beautifully Designed Homes for Outdoor Living.

1. 
   For an architectual point of view, it covers superb floor plans, internally it gives you a peek into another world and the out door finishes are to be seen to be believed. These are coffee table books for just not any home, but every home.

3 comments about Casa Mexicana Style.

1. Loved this book. Great inspiration and colourful delights for the eyes and the soul. Makes your heart fly with the possibilities in design, travel, art and texture - just great.



2. This is a beautiful book, wonderful photography and architecturally very interesting. It is also very heavy, large, and it only shows buildings. I have no room or need for it on my interior design shelves.



3. I am an interior designer and have always been fascinated by the use of color in Mexico. This book is eye candy for any designer. The pictures are amazing and the photography wonderful. I have picked up this book so many times I have bookmarked almost every page for ideas. Great inspiration!

5 comments about Perspective for Interior Designers.

1. When I first started looking at the explanation for perspective I thought it was pretty good. But as it went on, I thought no one is going to pay me to take this much time to do a rendered drawing! This book could be good for developing your eye and understanding of perspective but there are short cuts that will give you better than acceptable results. There are also books that have more to offer in terms of rendering the presentation. I have found that no one singular book completely communicates everything you need. This one, I could have done without.



2. This book is a helpful tool for those of us struggling with perspectives. Page by page written and visual instructions assist in not just drawing perspectives, but really understanding how they are put together! Even for those who are new to the world of drawing and explaining concepts via drawing! THANKS!



3. I really like the book!...
   The content of this book it's easy to understand.



4. This is a great book to have. Easy reading, nice illustrations, great information.



5. This book takes perspective to another level. I have been taught perspective before with 1, 2, and/ or 3 vanishing points, so I thought that I knew what I was doing. But sometimes I just had to eyeball some of the perspective in my drawings, because objects would look too distorted. This book showed me what I was doing (and taught at art school) that was acceptable but not perfect. Within the first few pages, I easily learned the correct rules to doing perspective from a floor plan at any point of view that I choose. I am a graphic designer for retail interiors and "Perspective for Interior Designers" has made my life so much easier. It's very easy to understand and follow...a must have!

5 comments about Build a Smokehouse: Storey Country Wisdom Bulletin A-81 (A Storey Country Wisdom Bulletin).

1. Build a Smokehouse: Storey Country Wisdom Bulletin A-81 (A Storey Country Wisdom Bulletin)
   A skiny little book but if you want to build a smoke house it is a nice one to have. I wish i had it fourty years ago before i tried to build my first smoke house. It would have not have burned down if I had followed the advice in this little book.



2. It is what it says it is. Basic instructions on building a smokehouse. They provide several types starting with simple to a permanent structure. It's a nice straight forward pamphlet.



3. Great Book, very cheap and full of very helpfull infomation, to cover every budget.



4. this book is all a beginner needs to gain a full understanding of self sufficiently smoking and curing meats. short but an excellent read full of practical knowledge.



5. Good book, but no novel, keeps things very basic and doesn't go into detail about parts that could improve finished product.