1 comments about The Essential Frank O. Gehry.

1. I found this book at the Indianapolis Institute of Arts. The author does a fine job of surveying Gehry's career and accomplishments. The reader is also offered some additional GENERAL information on various influencing architects, and architectual syles and/or movements. While the text is concise, it is truly unpretentious. The photographs are splendid, especially those showing his masterpiece, the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao. While this is not a full treatise on the works and influence of Gehry's career, it is exactly as the title suggests: it offers the essentials of Gehry's artistry and mastery.

No comments about Gaudi: Architect and Artist (Temporis Collection).

1 comments about Beginnings - Charles Rennie Mackintosh's Early Sketches.

1. This is a great book for those interested the evolution of the architect, Charles Rennie Mackintosh. It shows a great assortment of sketches from early traveling years to his genesis explorations of the natural (arts and crafts) in the abstracted stylized botanical sketches toward the end of the book. The book also shows a glimpse into the eye of mackintosh, through his vernacular studies of castles and towers.
   The format is that of an art book, displaying the sketches with very little explaination, but this book would be a great resource to those who appreciate the life and work of Mackintosh.

No comments about Pacific Houses.

1 comments about Erich Mendelsohn's "Amerika": 82 Photographs.

1. This book inspired Fritz Lang in his production of one of the all-time classic movies, Metropolis (1927). The book is a great deal for anyone interested in photographs of New York at its height of world architectural domination, and it's evident how they led to the fabulous, haunting set designs in the movie.

No comments about Three American Architects: Richardson, Sullivan, and Wright, 1865-1915.

3 comments about Shaker Built: The Form and Function of Shaker Architecture.

1. "Shaker Built" is "Shaker Lite". Lots of postcard pictures from the most popular Shaker villages. And lots of cliches about Shaker life, work, and art. "Shaker Built" will look nice on the coffee table, but for brains and beauty, check out Nicoletta's "Architecture of the Shakers".



2. "Shaker Built" is "Shaker Lite". Lots of postcard pictures from the most popular Shaker villages. And lots of cliches about Shaker life, work, and art. "Shaker Built" will look nice on the coffee table, but for brains and beauty, check out Nicoletta's "Architecture of the Shakers".



3. this is an excellet book,, really enjoyed it. makes you want to travel to america just to have alook at all buildings.

No comments about Bohlin Cywinski Jackson: Farrar.

No comments about South Beach Style.

1 comments about Early American Architecture: From the First Colonial Settlements to the National Period.

1. I picked up this book inexpensively, secondhand, to use as a reference because it has a lot of very good photos and floor plans. But I glanced at the first page and was hooked. It's an incredibly well-written, well-balanced, unbiased, well-organized, and informed view of colonial architecture extant in the U.S. in the mid-20th century, when the book was written.

   Morrison tells in the introduction that his goal was to write a comprehensive history of the topic. And he's done a stellar job. It's the first such book I've seen that gives significant treatment not only of the Spanish Southwest (with separate chapters on each of those states and what distinguishes each state's architecture from that of the other S.W. states) but also devotes a significant portion of its pages to French Colonial architecture, not just of New Orleans, but also of the entire French Mississippi Valley and parts of the Gulf Coast.

   A bit about the composition of the book: Morrison devotes entire sections of chapters or entire chapters themselves to the background of a particular style (e.g, Dutch colonial in the New York area), but then gives a major portion of the text over to descriptions of prime examples of the styles he's just described. Several houses and public buildings are discussed in each section, almost always with photos, often with floor plans and interior shots.

   Morrison's unbiased and comprehensive coverage of a very wide-ranging subject is extremely well done, with the exception of just one rather amusing bit of editorializing: he doesn't seem to like dormers, or at least seems to prefer 17th century gables to dormers. Other than that funny (and seldom-appearing) idiosyncrasy, the book is a wonderful educational tool and reference book for the layperson. The fact that this book was originally published more than 50 years ago and is still in print is an amazing testement to the fact that it's so well written.