3 comments about Hamptons Havens: The Best of Hamptons Cottages and Gardens (Hamptons Cottages & Gardens).

1. A lovely book with interesting stories but I was after beach gardens and there are very few. The title is misleading as it is from the magazine by this name.



2. This is a beautiful book which is as entertaining to read as it is to gaze at the pictures! I would have appreciated it more had all the houses featured been in a similar style to the one on the cover. There is quite a large spectrum of different designs. I wished they had presented more photographs of each individual home, but overall there is plenty to feast your eyes on.



3. The book was purchased for an anniversary gift for my daughter who resides on one of the Hamptons. She liked the book and even was familiar with the owner of the garden on the cover.

3 comments about New York 2000: Architecture and Urbanism from the Bicentennial to the Millennium (New York).

1. NewYork as I know and love it.This is an exceptional book,it explains why the city is like it is.Every outstanding architecture is well described and it is readable by everyone.



2. At 1300 pages this is quite comprehensive and exhaustively researched. NYC has had a real resurgence in skyscraper building in the last ten years or so and many good buildings have been built..like the Time Warner Bldg. the Bloomberg Tower, and the New York Times building..and so far it looks like the world trade center site is going to have some specacular buildings, frankly im still not sure about the Freedom Tower(please find a new name, lord)design but it's so much better than that untenable Libeskind designed, frankly I love the Norman Foster design but whatever, but I digress...as for this book it's fantastic and if you love NYC you will have to have this in you collection, really a complete, thorough book on current architecture in NYC, buy this book you wont be disappointed.



3. I bought this book as a gift for my boss who loves both NYC and architecture. He loved it! I looked through it before giving it to him and agree it is a great book. It's $100 in the book stores, so it is a good buy on Amazon for $63.00. Great for anyone who loves NYC.

3 comments about Forgotten Philadelphia: Lost Architecture of the Quaker City.

1. This is a great book. Philadelphia was blessed with some beautiful buildings and sad to say many did not service so called progress. The vintage images were very interesting and the text was very informative. Philadelphia did lose many buildings that never should have been destroyed, but many of the historic buildings on Society Hill or great buildings like Independence Hall and its annex buildings, survive and I do like what the park service did to house the Liberty Bell, it's sort of Modern Georgian. It's hard to believe that the iconic City Hall building was so close to being pulled down, it barely survived, I mean can you image Philadelphia without City Hall?!!! so it could have been worse...and Wannamakers is still extant, though it's now called Lord and Taylor and at least the greatest of department store buildings is still open and glorious, but i do wish they would get rid of that ridiculous steel stucture substituting for the great Franklins home..its awful..just rebuild it and let people know it's a reproduction..this is BEN FRANKLINS HOUSE, people!!! I do love how Philadelphia cherish's the great Franklin, he is the greatest of the founding father's and he gets his due respect in his home town..i still cant believe that he does not have a huge memorial in Washington, it's a travesty. Great book..if you have any love at all for architecture history of Philadelphia in general...oh and Philadelphians dont let them tear down Lynnewood Hall in Elkins Park, it's the last of the great Gilded age estates in Philadelphia, it's on it's last leg..dont let it go the way of the late, great Whitemarsh Hall.



2. Tom Keels has produced a treasure of a book. There are many compilations of photographs of old Philadelphia, but Keels supplies what others mostly lack -- a brief but rich history and context for each of the lost buildings he documents. Many of the photographs will be familiar to anyone interested in Philadelphia history, but this should not discourage you from buying the book. You will learn a great deal, thanks to Keels' perspicacious research. Moreover, his prose is graceful and witty, never stodgy.



3. This is an amazing book and concept! It's a guided tour of Philadelphia history like no other. The maps in the book are especially effective in highlighting the changes in the Philadelphia landscape over the years. I used the same Philadelphia based cartographers, NaZa, for ABC Philadelphia to highlight the best and most current places for Philadelphia families today, now I'm wondering about the best family places in Philadelphia from yesteryear. This will be on the top of my holiday list this year.

No comments about Smaller Houses of the 1920s: 55 Examples (Dover Books on Architecture).

3 comments about Neoclassicism in the North: Swedish Furniture and Interiors 1770-1850.

1. A rich variety of houses, some grander than the others, but all well-to-do peoples dwellings. Some of the manors featured aren't very well known even in Sweden, but they certainly deserve their place here. The few I do miss are featured in "The Swedish Room" e.i. Lay-out-wise it is by now perhaps a little dated, but the auther knows his subject very well and the accompaning photos are mostly marvellous. When a Swede writes on Swedish interiors the result is accurate as this book shows.



2. This book is a treasure of neoclassicism in Sweden. It is supported by sensible (not gushy interior design talk) text and is logically sequenced.

   The pictures and additional material is excellent; although the lighting in some of the photographs is less than perfect.

   This is an inspirational reference for the topic.




3. This is another great book for Swedish decorative detail .A great asset in the decorative artist`s Library.A good source for Bolander`s beautiful wall murals. Great photography with excellent detail shots .A beautiful and knowledgable book. I am a decorative artist specializing in custom painted furniture for decorators and designers and have found this book to be a great resource and very helpful in my work.

No comments about Indian Style: Landscapes, Houses, Interiors, Details (Icon (Taschen)).

5 comments about New England's Covered Bridges: A Complete Guide.

1. This book has been like a bible to me as I set out to photograph covered bridges in New Hampshire and Vermont.
   
   I've used the book in conjunction with my laptop based GPS system to plan my trips and prioritize which bridges to look at. The book is very clearly written, gives interesting historical and structural information, and most importantly, directions for finding the bridges.
   
   The color photos are high quality, so you get a good idea what to expect when you get there. If you're into touring the covered bridges of New England, New England's Covered Bridges: A Complete Guide is a worthwhile investment.



2. This book is very professionally done and is a great bargain at this price. It's a compact size which makes it convienent to carry with you on trips. Another thing I like is the GPS coordinates that they have recorded for each bridge. Anyone who enjoys seeking out old covered bridges should have this book. I highly recommend it! 5 STARS!
   
   Brian McKee, Editor of "The Bridge-Covered Quarterly"



3. This is another book I bought as a Christmas present for my grandson when I learned of his interest in covered bridges. This is a good history of covered bridges in New England. I enjoyed this because of the excellent pictures and know my grandson will enjoy it too.



4. This book was well worth the money. There was only 1 mistake in directions(p.136, Bement Br.,NH, should be west on NH103). We used it for bridges in Mass.,Me.,NH, and VT.



5. I found this book to be very helpful so far... I only visited a couple of the waterfalls in the book so far and the directions seemed to be right on. If you are seeking waterfalls in NE then this may be the book you are looking for.

2 comments about What is Japanese Architecture?: A Survey of Traditional Japanese Architecture.

1. I've been searching for a book such as this for quite some time. I purchased this book as source material for 3D modeling, and all the hand drawn illustrations are simply amazing! Many interior, exterior and close-up shots of Japanese architecture. Several floor plans and isometric views of various homes and temples.

   Having only recieved my book the day before, I have not had a chance to read it from cover to cover, but what I have read was informative and well written. While you may not be able to build your very own "to code" Japanese home with this book, as a source of information and inspiration, it's a tremendous book!




2. This is a good guide to Japanse architecture and it's styles. It contains many illustrations, and is a detailed description on types of Traditional Japanese architecture.

5 comments about The Dream Palaces of Hollywood's Golden Age.

1. A nice coffee table book that has wonderful photos and very interesting commentary on each house. Not only are the associations with various movie people interesting but equally good was reading how most of the houses had to be rehabilitated and what was involved. A nice book to read in short spurts.



2. The images and text in this book are of poor quality. If you are expecting a coffee table quality book of the same caliber as an Architectural Digest, look somewhere else.



3. I thoroughly enjoyed this book from cover to cover. There are so many interesting stories and tid bits about the stars of Hollywood's golden age. From the suave Cary Grant to the powerful DeMille to the comic W.C. Fields. The homes are anywhere from spectacular to homey. This book also covers some famous theaters and restaurants. I highly recommend it!



4. Fantastic book that gives you access to the lifestyles of the truly privledged in Los Angeles. Jaw dropping pictures that other books can only dream of publishing. This is a must buy for anyone interested in Southern California architecture.



5. I loved this book. Something about the pictures... one feels like you're actually there... technically part of it is that the human eye sees inside and outside. Photographers get one of the other... but not both. In these pictures it feels like you are walking through a house... seeing it as a guest of the famous resident... and seeing it as you would if you were there in person. You can look at the room, the furniture, or out the window. There's an emotional quality that was stirred in me.
   
   Likewise, the text is telling tidbits and gems that the famous owner might reveal to a friend... One learns things that you wouldn't dare ask. Its a great marriage between the past private and public lives of people that we all know. Though they are long in their graves, they come to life in this fascinating book.
   
   I'd been in some of these homes. The Charles Laughton home in Palos Verdes, Portugese Bend, was a fascinating journey as a kid... walking over Peacock Flats, through the Vanderlip estate... looking for feathers, and hoping not to be caught. The fear that Quasimodo would emerge and chase us, I can still feel it. I think that going back there in the book, this was my favorite.

2 comments about Jean Prouve, 1901-1984: The Dynamics of Creation (Basic Architecture Series).

1. very good introduction to Prouvre's work.
   
   This book is really just an overview of his career but it is very well laid out and informative. I think that the conciseness of the book is a real advantage. That said I really want to find out more.



2. This is the twentieth volume in the German Publishing Company Taschen's Basic Architecture Series. In previous volumes, Taschen has done an excellent job of summing up the careers of most the world's greatest modernist architects. It is fitting that after the first round of iconic masters, (Mies, Corbusier, Wright, Gropius) that Taschen has now moved on to other important modernist architects and designers.
   
   In most surveys of modern architecture, Jean Prouve's buildings are not prominently featured. He did not design the iconic buildings with which other great architects are usually closely identified. Today, Jean Prouve is probably best known for his furniture designs. However, Prouve contributed to the modernist agenda in other ways. As a designer, he produced some of the first modular metal buildings. Most of the metal buildings we see today are the grandchildren of the designs he first originated in the 1930's. However, his single greatest accomplishment is as one of the inventors of curtain walls. We may not be aware of them but they are all around us.
   
   Jean Prouve's work is not an easily accesible as some of the other great architects and designers of the period. Nevertheless, he was a powerful, inovative figure whose vision helped shaped the modern world. At a ten dollars a volume, this book is another Taschen success.