The Not So Big House: A Blueprint for the Way We Really Live

Beautifully written and illustrated book on so much more than just houses. If you want to get back to human and understand what really makes a house a home, read this.

This is my second copy of this book as I lent it to someone and never got it back! It really helped me when designing my last house and I need it again for my next one. Wonderful book and an absolute essential for anyone wanting to either design or remodel a house to get best use of the space - and generally with a "wow" factor as well.

Ok

This is a wonderful book; beautifully written and full of excellent illustrations and photos. It's clearly aimed at a US audience, but it equally applies to other parts of the developed world. I can't recommend it enough -- anyone planning or just wishing (like me) to build their own home should read this.

Too US centric to be any use to me. I like some of the concepts but would have preferred a rewrite performed by someone familiar with European living spaces. I got to a line which was something like "perhaps have a 3,000 sq ft house, instead of 6,000 sq ft" and I knew that we were done here.

I live in the UK and as far as I can make out from this book the Americans are trying to learn from our years of housing development. So if you are intending to build in the UK, buy a book that is UK related and not this one which is totally American related.