Hide 

Whether you want to have a timber frame home built for you or want to build one yourself, here are all the basics of building with timbers. Co-authors, Jack Sobon and Roger Schroeder explain how to design for both strength and beauty and includes a starter project (a 12' x 16' toolshed) to develop your skills.

Hide 

Until now, the green roof movement has been limited to large-scale, professional endeavors and public buildings. But homeowners everywhere are catching onto the benefits of a green roof — water conservation, energy savings, and storm water management. In Small Green Roofs authors Nigel Dunnett, Dusty Gedge, John Little, and Edmund Snodgrass profile ordinary homeowners who scaled green roofs down to the domestic level.

Small Green Roofs is the first book to focus on small-scale and domestic green roofs. More than 40 profiles of small and domestic-scale projects of all shapes and sizes include green roofs on sheds, garden offices, studios, garages, houses, bicycle sheds, and other small structures, as well as several community projects. For each project, details are given for design, construction, and installation, as well as how-to tips on how the roof was planted and cared for.

For readers looking for inspiration when hiring a contractor or taking the adventurous step of building their own, Small Green Roofs provides the knowledge and encouragement to make it possible.

Hide 

CLEARANCE ITEM. PREVIOUS RETAIL PRICE WAS $39.95 AVAILABLE ONLY WHILE SUPPLIES LAST!

Green roofs — the ultimate in sustainable building practices — continue to generate enormous interest and enthusiasm among architects, landscape designers, and urban planners. Increasingly strict stormwater regulations and the appeal of LEED-related projects have also boosted the popularity and desirability of green roofs. Those who want to build green roofs, however, have few resources to guide them. Until now, no book has taken a comprehensive look at how to effectively adapt green-roof technology to the variable and extreme North American climate, and how to design projects that will function and endure as successfully as those in Germany, Switzerland, and other European countries.

This book fills the gap by providing an overview of practices and techniques that have been effective in North America. The authors offer options regarding structure, function, horticulture, and logistics, as well as surveys of actual projects and analyses of why they have or haven’t succeeded. Approachable and reader-friendly, the manual clearly explains how these complex systems function and how to plan and carry out projects successfully from concept through construction and maintenance. Ideally suited to professionals (including architects, landscape architects, engineers, and designers) and their clients, it brings together key lessons from leaders in the field. Numerous photographs highlight the range of design possibilities and show green roofs both during construction and at various stages of maturity.

At last, those seeking basic information about how to design and build green roofs have a concise, authoritative guide to this exciting new technology.

Hide 

CLEARANCE ITEM. PREVIOUS RETAIL PRICE WAS $29.95 AVAILABLE ONLY WHILE SUPPLIES LAST!

In just a few years, green roofs have gone from a horticultural curiosity to a booming growth industry — primarily because the environmental benefits of extensively planted roofs are now beyond dispute, whether for industrial or governmental complexes or for private homes in urban or suburban settings. Despite the high level of interest in green roofs, until now there has been no reliable reference devoted exclusively to the various species of drought-tolerant plants that are suitable for use on extensive green roofs. Green Roof Plants fills that void. The book contains photographs and cultural information for more than 200 species and cultivars of plants, including valuable data on moisture needs, heat tolerance, hardiness, bloom color, foliage characteristics and height. Concise, accurate, and easy to use, this book is destined to become an indispensable practical reference guide, not just for architects, landscape designers, engineers, and environmentalists, but also for environmentally conscious home gardeners.

Hide 

The City Homesteader is the handbook for the world of self-sufficient living. It's about living tangibly in a virtual world. It's about being resourceful, saving money, reducing consumption and increasing self-reliance. Join the many who are raising backyard chickens in the city and tilling their side yards: tapping into natural energy, managing homes more efficiently and getting back to the earth. Explore the homesteading arts: gardening on small and large scales, raising dwarf fruit trees, sprouting grains, smoking meats and fish, grinding grains for flour, making cheese, making wine, cellaring, heating without fossil fuel, harvesting rainwater, composting, and much more. The City Homesteader provides all the basics, including how to find supplies and step-by-step instructions that make it easy to follow along. Original illustrations throughout help you create your very own homestead on any piece of earth.

Recommended Product for Wiser Living: Today, more than ever before, our society is seeking ways to live more conscientiously. To help bring you the very best inspiration and information about greener, more sustainable lifestyles, MOTHER EARTH NEWS is recommending books to readers. For 40 years, MOTHER EARTH NEWS has been North America’s “Original Guide to Living Wisely,” creating books and magazines for people with a passion for self-reliance and a desire to live in harmony with nature.

Hide 

Whether building a summer cottage in the woods, planning the hunting cabin of your dreams or homesteading off the grid, this handy reference provides a logical and sensible approach to building permanent shelter in out-of-the-way places. Including everything from choosing and clearing a site and creating an electrical power source, to clearing the land and creating a foundation, this book offers instruction on building an A-frame cabin and a rustic log cabin with a framed roof. There is also a special section on designing small buildings to cope with Mother Nature, including earthquakes, heavy snow, high wind and flooding.

Hide 

CLEARANCE ITEM. PREVIOUS RETAIL PRICE WAS $39.95. AVAILABLE ONLY WHILE SUPPLIES LAST!

Creating Better Homes for a Healthier Planet

Good Green Homes is the answer to creating better homes that are healthier to live in, easier on the environment, less expensive over the long-term, and more delightful to come home to.

Hide 

CLEARANCE ITEM. PREVIOUS RETAIL PRICE WAS $35.00. AVAILABLE ONLY WHILE SUPPLIES LAST!

Inspirational houses from around the world: how architects and home owners can achieve harmony between dwellings and nature

Our houses can be seen as living, breathing entities, extensions of ourselves and our families. This carefully considered publication provides the design inspiration to build and live in domestic spaces in a balanced, natural, sustainable way.

With the demands of all contemporary dwellings in mind-whether they're found in the city, suburbs, or country-Dominic Bradbury considers the design basics one must follow in order to coexist with the planet's resources.

Five chapters present successful projects from different parts of the globe, all specially photographed by Richard Powers.

• Design and Build: where and how to create a modern natural home
• Let There Be Light: manipulating the elements to improve lifestyle and interaction with nature
• The Material World: using natural products to establish healthier relationships with the environment
• Indoor/Outdoor Living: ideas for encouraging symbiotic relationships with the landscape, whether in the city or the country
• Sustainable Footprints: how to naturally reduce domestic energy use

Hide 

CLEARANCE ITEM. PREVIOUS RETAIL PRICE WAS $24.95 AVAILABLE ONLY WHILE SUPPLIES LAST!

Award-winning designer and author Lori Dennis proves interior design can be both stylish and environmentally sustainable in this easy-to-use, entertaining guide. Dennis discusses every aspect of interior design —furniture and accessories, window treatments, fabrics, surface materials, appliances, plants, and more — from a green perspective in terms of reducing waste and pollution and turning a home into a healthy, comfortable environment. Readers will learn how to:

• use sustainable materials like bamboo, cork, and recycled glass to enhance interiors
• search thrift shops and antique stores for vintage hidden treasures
• find the best vendors for purchasing green products
• use plants and locally cut flowers to improve indoor air quality and brighten up rooms
• replace lawns with indigenous plants and edible gardens
• keep rooms clean with effective and nontoxic products
• use energy efficient lighting and maximize natural light
• apply for different types of green certification

Hide 

Advances in solar technology have made many DIY-friendly products available to consumers. These include solar water heaters, solar battery charging stations, solar-powered lights, photovoltaic shingles that provide supplementary electricity, solar heat pumps, and solar panel kits that generate primary home electrical service. Among the step-by-step projects is a solar water heating system you can build and install yourself for under $1,000; simple thermosyphon solar heat collectors for barns and outbuildings; and "heat grabbers" that you can fabricate for $50 in materials and position below a south-facing window to provide auxiliary winter heat.

Want to read more? Preview this book: How to Make a Solar Still.