Adobe Houses for Today - by Laura Sanchez & Alex Sanchez (Paperback)

About the Book

The book features 12 plans for compact, beautifully proportioned adobe homes in modern and traditional styles. The richly illustrated text shows how the basic houses, designed for today's smaller families, can be expanded and adapted to fit readers' own budgets, family sizes, style preferences, and building sites.

Book Synopsis

Since Adobe Houses for Today first appeared, interest in energy efficiency has exploded. Showing the pathway to smaller, solar tempered, easy-to-heat homes using adobe, one of the world's most energy efficient building materials, makes this book about adobe houses not only for today, but also for tomorrow. The book features 12 plans for compact, beautifully proportioned adobe homes in modern and traditional styles. The richly illustrated text shows how the basic houses, designed for today's smaller families, can be expanded and adapted to fit readers' own budgets, family sizes, style preferences, and building sites. After a brief look at adobe's history, Adobe Houses for Today surveys adobe's advantages as a building material, illustrates adobe construction, and gives an eye-opening tour through the facts and fantasies of energy conservation. The heart of the book details the plans, using them as examples of design techniques that increase livability and control costs in any house. The book and its minimal-cost construction drawings are valuable, enjoyable tools for those buying, building, or remodeling a house. With this new edition, which includes an additional chapter with stories from people who have built the houses, construction drawings are now available for some of the expanded versions.

Review Quotes

"...a wealth of information about the history and techniques associated with the use of adobe." -Library Journal "...a fascinating wealth of information and lore." -The Bookwatch "Helpful for anyone buying, building, or remodeling an adobe house as well as for contractors, drafters, and real estate brokers." -Book News "...argues by example that adobe construction need not be a costly luxury reserved only for the wealthy." -Su Casa "...at last, a book written by authors who understand solar and thermal mass!" -Adobe Builder