5 comments about Cabins and Camps.

1. Had some very interesting cabins. Liked the work. Something very original to have sit on your coffee table for when people come over.



2. I enjoyed this book but found it a little too rustic; kind of over-the-top for the average rustic aficionado. The same styles were repeated over and over with little variation.



3. Beautiful coffee table book. The pictures are large and there are many of them. The focus of the book was on the Adirondack style mostly and birch Adirondack style furniture.



4. This book is a banquet for the eyes. The reader feasts upon the visuals and is drawn into the rooms, the homes, and one can almost smell the wood.
   
   The author knows his subject and shares it well. I keep my copy on the coffee table in the living room as a wonderful accent to the room.
   
   It reads well and I am intrigued as to who the owners might be of the wonderful houses, homes, structures. Privacy is very important, but that is my only "complaint" with the book. I would like to know who the owners are. It would seem more personal.
   
   The book is wonderful.



5. This is by far the best cabin/camp book I own! Pages and pages of gorgous camps and cabins with wonderful decorating. I own many rustic decorating books and this is tops!! All Ralph Kylloes books are great but this one is the best! The pictures of inside all the beautiful camps and cabins is a true feast for the eye! I look at this book at least once a week and never tire of the homes and always put the book down with more ideas on how to make my home more rustic and adirondack/camp like. I can't imagine if you are a person that is into camp decorating that you would ever be disatisfied-it is truely the best of its kind!!

1 comments about The Concrete Dragon: China's Urban Revolution and What it Means for the World.

1. After seeing China's economic growth and urban explosion as a first-time visitor to Beijing, this book explained the why and how of everything I'd just witnessed. A good mix of historical perspective balanced with contemporary phenomena. The author's own photographs are right-on.

5 comments about Scrapbook Borders, Corners & Titles (Memory Makers).

1. I was hoping this book had more pizzazz to it, but was disappointed in the majority of the boarders. The instructions and the templates were very well written, but not a book for the beginner for certain. I just thought the book was dull.



2. I'm new to scrapbooking so got this book for ideas. There were few interesting ideas but...
   1) Required too many tools and supplies that I didn't have (I already have several hundred $s worth of tool and supplies).
   2) Too many steps! The design process seemed too complex. It seemed like it'd take me an hour just to get the first 5 steps done, let alone the remaing 15 steps.
   3) The designs weren't to my taste. I thought lot of the designs seem to "folksy" or too busy looking. I prefer more clean and "modern" look.
   Overall, I found the book to be more discouraging to a new scrapbooker like me than inspiring.



3. I like scrapbooking but am not interested in this book. I bought based on the descriptions and reviews. Very disappointed in that most of the pages, if not all, have something too thick on them. I like my pages to lay flat and not bulk up my albums. Cute ideas for framing or displays... but a lot of the best parts don't lay flat enough for me and my scrapbook albums. Lots of techniques are shown, but many are also too time-consuming or too involved or, as other said, require too many different materials/tools (thus cost too much) for me. I want cute and quick. Precious yet balanced with my time and effort.



4. This is a great book for scrapbooking. I have several scrapbooks, and this book is my favorite. The pages are so nicely done, and each page comes with directions, and a supply list of materials you will need to complete the project.



5. This book has a bit of basic information on tools and supplies and then has a section on each season showing different borders, corners and titles for each one. The ideas are unique and instructions are given with photos on how to complete each one. I think it is a worthwhile book.

3 comments about Bookmaking: Editing, Design, Production, Third Edition.

1. Ignore the review complaining about the long wait for the 3rd edition. The 3rd is here and it's great. I have a core library of titles that I recommend to folks who are seriously interested in the real process of publishing, not the polyanna version sold to vanity publishers. This book is essential reading for understanding the broad scope of the publishing process. The chapters on production are particularly useful.



2. One of the best texts on the production of books is "Bookmaking" by Marshall Lee. The second edition is more than twenty years old, but the third edition was just published. It covers virtually all topics, from word-processing to book printing, and everything in between. Most importantly, it shows how the computer has changed the publishing world. 

   NOTE: Don't pay attention to "A Reader"'s review -- "Reader" is criticizing the publisher, W. W. Norton, for taking so long to print Lee's book. It's like criticizing Tiger Woods because the golf course is closed.




3. For the past 2-1/2 years, I have seen this book's publication date set back season after season.

   Where is it? Why the constant pushing back of publication date?

   The third edition is sorely needed. The second edition is more than twenty years old, and the entire pre-press section is thoroughly outdated and worthless.

   Norton, get your act together!

3 comments about The Metropolis of Tomorrow (Dover Books on Architecture).

1. I think that generally Dover Books are to be congratulated on reprinting many books that otherwise might never be seen again and priced very reasonably too. I don't think any plaudits are in order on this book though. I found the text very dull and the pictures gave an overall impression of blackness.
   
   Hugh Ferris managed to develop a wonderful rendering technique (being trained as an architect no doubt helped) that seemed so suited to commercial buildings of size, especially skyscrapers. His black and white artwork is simply stunning but it needs to be printed on quality paper to bring out the subtleties of grey shading. The main problem with the book is the paper does nothing for his work and I was really made aware of this when I recently bought 'Power in Buildings' (ISBN 0940512114) a lovely reprint of his 1953 book. The fourth of his famous renderings from Evolution of the Set-back Building appears in both books but in the 'Power' edition the image looks so right.
   
   His writing in 'Metropolis' came across as very long-winded, for example, this is from the last page of the book:
   'As for personal and specific proposals, the author well knows how many parapets, other than the one we are now leaving, overlook the imaginary "Metropolis of Tomorrow" and he shares the common belief that few of the many visualizations currently being formulated can contribute more than a particle to the ultimate actuality'
   The ten pages of words and pictures devoted to Set-back I thought the most interesting part of what he had to say.
   
   Get his 'Power' book for a much better appreciation of his architectural thoughts and the fifty main renderings really look beautiful on good paper.



2. Ferriss's drawings had an immediate impact on architecture. Some of his projections are the purest distilling of Art Deco application to buildings one can find from the age. But Ferriss's effect on cinema and illustration has been very powerful as well, and far less documented. The 1-star-off is because the reproduction quality -- quite good, no doubt -- leaves some to be desired, nonetheless: the sfumato effects appear more like soft-focus than atmosphere and the graininess brings to mind infra-red film more than the grit of a huge city fueled by leaded gas and coal.



3. To say that this 1920's classic is anything other than a masterpiece would be proof of insanity. By "interpreting" a Law, (NY Zoning 1917), Ferriss found beauty in the hope of what might be. In today's world of 3D CAD and computers, Ferriss was able to use canvas to convey not merely ideas and requirements, but opportunities and emotions. There are few books that inspire architects more than this. The value of original prints of this is evident in that single plates are sold in New York for $20 apiece by street vendors Architects are usually too caught up in the details to appreciate the beauty of buildings. Leave it then, to a painter to bring out the beauty and grace of buildings that were meant to inspire, or were not meant to be.

1 comments about Super Normal: Sensations of the Ordinary.

1. This book is a gem. It is beautifully designed and the show was the most interesting in the whole Salone in 2007.
   It is a tribute to some of the objects that make our life better without screaming out loud. There are about 200 objects created by various well-known designers and not. The objects are mostly European and Japanese and were selected by Morrison and Fukasawa.
   
   Highly recommended
   Check out: http://2021supernormal.wordpress.com/

No comments about Treehouse Living: 50 Innovative Designs.

5 comments about The Phenomenon of Life: Nature of Order, Book 1: An Essay on the Art of Building and the Nature of the Universe (The Nature of Order).

1. I've read both of Alexander's "A Pattern Language" and "The Timeless Way of Being". "The Nature of Order" is similar. Alexander has spent a good part of his life developing a philosophy of aesthetics as it relates to structure. I am not an architect but I tend to deal with project design and many of the ideas he presents as applied to architecture can be applied in other areas as well. The notion of what constitutes "goodness" is universal.
   
   I have posted his 15 principles on my filing cabinet and intend to give his arguments some thought before going ahead to the second book. It is interesting to consider that what we appreciate most, be it an inanimate object such as a rock or a piece of music, the layout of a building or the complexities of human relationship is the degree to which each exhibit "life". Alexander took years to come up with his categorizations and conclusions so it is natural that one should take a bit of time to digest what he says. I do hope the publisher keeps this series in print so that I can return to it later. (Judging by the # of comments on and sales rank of successive volumes 2-4 I sense a dwindling audience or at least cautious audience.)
   
   I recommend this book to artists, architects, those interested in the philosophy of aesthetics, and designers of all kinds. Alexander's work is poetic and mystical and relies heavily on internal insights and so will not appeal to everyone, however I regard myself as fairly grounded in realism, spreadsheets and decision making and find his work worthy of consideration.



2. Read 'The Fifteen Properties' excerpted in the 'First Nomination for Book of the Century' customer review, or any other excerpt, and then consider the words of Gordon L. Prescott from 'The Fountainhead':
   
   "The flowing life which comes from the sense of order in chaos, or, if you prefer, from unity in diversity, as well as vice-versa, which is the realization of the contradiction inherent in architecture, is here absolutely absent. I am really trying to express myself as clearly as I can, but it is impossible to present a dialectic state by covering it up with an old fig leaf of logic just for the sake of the mentally lazy layman."
   
   I wish I could give a 'no star' review, but amazon doesn't have that option.



3. Anne Broadbent's review below is completely unjustified. She writes "At the beginning of the first book, Alexander shows a beautiful pagoda - but I still think I wouldn't want to have one near me, in the guise of a shopping centre, school, house, gym, restaurant, bank or whatever: I'd rather see it in its original cultural setting." Alexander agrees completely with this point. His whole theory involves local adaptation following the fundamental properties and transformations that he has outlined in these books. Nowhere does he suggest that we should use the pagoda's form in any other cultural context. If you look at some of the examples he gives from nature you will understand this. He discusses the way sand dunes form following some of the fundamental properties. Does this mean he claims we should create sand dunes in the jungle? Of course not. Examples of buildings, places, and natural phenomena, are used as a means of displaying these fundamental properties and how these properties occur universally in phenomena which the majority of humans, and all other life forms would agree contain the quality of life. Throughout the series of books, Alexander provides hundreds of examples of human creations and natural creations to support his thesis. This may or may not be news to Miss Broadbent, but this is widely acknowledged as good scientific method.



4. I very much enjoyed 'Pattern Language' and had great hopes for this series, however, after finishing book one, I am not sure I will invest in further volumes. I give the author credit for the time and effort spent in trying to develop his 'unified field theory' of good design, but unlike some of the common sense examples in Pattern language, this book moves to a level of metaphysical abstraction that seems to stretch the ideas past their breaking point. Not-Separateness? The Void? Though he makes a valiant effort, I just couldn't shake the fact that I was reading an after-the-fact justification of the authors pre-conceived tastes. Which essentially boil down to: old = good, new = bad.
   Most off-putting also, were the scrawled, barely legible sketches that were meant to illustrate some of the principles. They are so poorly rendered as to be distracting and not very helpful to boot. I would expect more graphic sense from someone purporting to explain the universal secrets of good design. I really wanted to love this book, but I find it simply frustrating.



5. I haven't finshed reading the content of this book - this is more a comment on the delivery medium...
   
   The 'hardcover' book more closely resembles a cardboard cover book. Mine is easily bent and permanently warped in multiple dimensions - makng it much more like your typical large paperback book than a $75 hardback book. It seems harder and harder for publishers to strike that balance between quantity and quality of pictorial content on the one hand, and quality and flashiness of the cover on the other.

3 comments about Form Based Codes: A Guide for Planners, Urban Designers, Municipalities, and Developers.

1. This is a good book rich with resources to easily understand why Form-Based Codes are needed to improve the formless nature of sprawl. The book does an excellent job of making practitioners understand how to go about putting together a Form-Based Code. The materials in the book are well-organized and presented with clear graphics. For the case studies -- especially where the Form-Based Codes have been implemented -- it would have been great to see images of what improvements in the built environment were actually achieved. Regardless, if you are an architect, planner or urban designer, get this book as it will enable you to write effective Form-Based Codes and help create better public realms.



2. A good form-based code depends on sophisticated design insights. But the book's reason for being is to explain the job to people without sophisticated design insights. (How else to change an entire built environment in a hurry?) Hence its incredible level of detail, right down to the best typography to use in presenting the proposed code. The book sets a floor: followed faithfully, it can enable diligent but uncreative professionals to produce a better form-based code than they might otherwise. That form-based code in turn will enable diligent but uncreative professionals to produce a better town or neighborhood than they might otherwise. But will that floor over time become a ceiling? Predictable outcomes are what residents want; but creativity isn't predictable.
   
   Full review at http://buildingcommunities.nd.edu/reviews-publications/



3. Form Based Codes provides an excellent ways to understand how design codes works in various stages in urban design field. I think this book guides very clear description in terms of preparing design codes and the management process. The material in this book illustrates excellently relationship between design and planning principles towards high quality environment. As an Urban Designer and Landscape Architect, I would like to express a great appreciation and many thanks to all authors.

1 comments about Detail in Process: Detail in Process (AsBuilt).

1. This is the second book in the new AsBuilt series. Its like the In Detail series with beautifully presented images and drawings, but because all the projects (many different building types) are built in North America, most of the drawings have units of measurement and terminology currently used in the USA, and include materials available for construction in the United States. There are also more kinds of drawings, models and renderings than the typical formats usually found in books about details, which gives the series a dynamic, contemporary quality. Highly recommended.