|
Building Green: A Complete How-To Guide to Alternative Building Methods Earth Plaster * Straw Bale * Cordwood * Cob * Living Roofs
|
| List Price: | $29.95 |
| Price: | $19.77 & eligible for FREE Super Saver Shipping on orders over $25. Details |
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
Ships from and sold by Amazon.com
59 new or used available from $14.95
Average customer review:
Product Description
This absolutely groundbreaking manual doesn't just talk about eco-friendly building techniques, but actually shows every step! More than 1,200 close-up photographs, along with in-depth descriptions, follow the real construction of an alternative house from site selection to the addition of final-touch interior details. Co-authors Clarke Snell and Timothy Callahan (a professional builder and contractor) provide thorough discussions of the fundamental concepts of construction, substitutes for conventional approaches, and planning a home that's not only comfortable and beautiful, but environmentally responsible. Then, they roll up their sleeves and get to work assembling a guest house that incorporates four different alternative building methods: straw bale, cob, cordwood, and modified stick frame. The images show every move: how the site is cleared, the basic structure put together, the cob wall sculpted, the bales and cordwood stacked, a living roof created, and more. Most important, the manual conveys real-world challenges and processes, and offers dozens of sidebars with invaluable advice. It's head and shoulders above all others in the field.
Product Details
- Amazon Sales Rank: #11874 in Books
- Published on: 2005-12-15
- Number of items: 1
- Binding: Paperback
- 616 pages
Editorial Reviews
From Publishers Weekly
This large, generously illustrated manual is an excellent primer on owner-designed and site-inspired building. Snell, who wrote the eco-friendly The Good House Book, and Callahan, a more conventional but highly experienced builder and contractor, take readers step-by-step through the creation of a charming little guesthouse, demonstrating a variety of "green" techniques along the way. They start with an introduction to building fundamentals and how alternative materials can provide the necessities of housing: structure, climate-control and separation from as well as connection to the outer world. Next comes a mini-course in design. But the bulk of the book is hands-on: the nuts-and-bolts of siting; foundations; flooring; living (plant-covered) roofs; and cob, cordwood, straw-bale and modified stick frame walls—although the book's minimal treatment of electricity and plumbing, and how to integrate them with unfamiliar materials like cob or straw-bale, disappoints. Snell's tendency to decry the sins of modern architectural practice can become exasperating, but doesn't diminish the value of his extensive experience-derived knowledge; and the grace and beauty of the authors' building project, featuring Callahan's fine finish work, is inspiring. The abundance of color photos detailing the construction process, supplemented by examples from indigenous buildings around the world, is particularly helpful. (Jan.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
About the Author
Clarke Snell is an expert in the field of green building and self-sufficiency. Author of The Good House Book (Lark, 2004), he lives in the mountains of Western North Carolina with his wife in a partially-bermed, passive-solar house in a small intentional community they helped create.
Tim Callahan is a practicing general contractor. An experienced timber-frame builder, Tim is currently focused on residential projects of unique character.
Customer Reviews
Building Green
My daughter and I purchased this wonderfully complete volume for a granddaughter who with her husband is moving to Oregon to build an eco-friendly home on a plot of land. This well-illustrated handbook should help a lot.
building green
What a wonderful book! I love the way it is set out in two sections... the theory and the practical. The conversational style of writing means that I feel like I have a friend on hand, ready to talk me through the whole process, explaining terms, concepts and methods in a clear, concise way.
I'd say if you are only planning to buy one book on alternative building methods, this should be the one.
Realistic Green Building for the long haul
This book is an excellent reference on how to build while taking the environment into consideration. I was really impressed with how they integrated traditional building techniques with Green Building techniques. The book covers what to think about before you even break ground, site work, foundation work, non chemical termite prevention, walls, windows, doors, roofing, flooring, and landscaping considerations. Where Green products make the most sense, they are used. In places where the authors chose a more traditional method (concrete in the foundation, small amounts of rebar, a mass produced new door, and timber roof trusses) they go into detail about why they chose that method (long term energy efficiency outweighing the initial energy cost of the raw materials). While grey water systems, rain catchment systems, composting toilets, and solar power systems are encouraged, they are not covered in any detail in this book. The demo house being built throughout the book is a tiny one room guest cottage, instead of a home that a family could live in (composting toilet outside) so that's why I only gave 4 stars. I would have loved to have seen a whole family home built, but maybe that would be several books.
Not everyone can move to an ecovillage and live in a 200 sq ft cob home (even if they dream about it). This book brings green building into the reach of many more people and shows how to build a home that is much more likely to pass code and be a real possibility in today's society. I plan to use it as a guide when I build my own home in the future.
