Book Description
Atomic Ranch is an in-depth exploration of post-World War II residential architecture in America. Mid-century ranches (1946-1970) range from the decidedly modern gable-roofed Joseph Eichler tracts in the San Francisco Bay area and butterfly wing houses in Palm Springs, Florida, to the unassuming brick or stucco L-shaped ranches and split-levels so common throughout the United States.
Customer Reviews:
Midcentury Modern Lover's Porn.......2007-05-05
Page after page of delicious midcentury modern yumminess. Unlike many architecture and design books, this one is actually well written.
Atomic Dressing.......2007-03-21
Eye candy of the past that we loved, environments we create from what we thought were futuristic but now an echo in the past. Great assortment of houses on display to tickle your midcentury fantasies that we can't afford now.
Mid Century Gem.......2007-03-05
I love this book! Every page is graced with mid century ranch homes lovingly photographed and described. If you have any interest at all in architecture, add this book to your collection.
Wonderful book on Ranch Homes.......2007-02-20
As a subscriber of the "Atomic Ranch" magazine, published by the same authors of this book, I had high expectations on its content, which were more than fulfilled, as i simply loved the book. It highlighted many homes that have been previously published on the magazine pages, but it had many others that I have not seen before in print, probably from the earlier issues I missed. The photos are superb, the book format is so elegant and perfect for Coffee Table display and the content is just wonderful. From Amazon, I have also purchased the Alan Hess book on Ranch Homes and the one from Katherine Samon on decorating Ranch homes, but "Atomic Ranch" is by far, my favorite of those three.
Mid century modern for the real world!.......2007-01-26
I have purchased many books on mid century modern style to get ideas for my remodeling project and while they were full of excellant examples of the style the biggest part of them only showed examples of high dollar showcase homes. (example: Frank lloyd Wright's creations) While they are beautiful they are far beyond my means and impractical for my life style. Atomic ranch fills the gap of real world affordable design and livablity that I was seeking. I have gotten many great ideas from Atomic ranch that I will likely use in my own home remodel. The book is excellant to browse, to read, or to use as an example when conveying your ideas to contractors or builders. Atomic ranch is a joy to any fan of serious modern, mid century, googie, or boom generation cold war living and style!! I can't recommend it more. Nuff said.
Book Description
Seventy–two step–by–step projects for modern do–it–yourself home and office design, by world–renowned designer Todd Oldham.
Love the look of mid–century, modern, retro design, but don't feel like dropping two weeks' pay on an Eames chair? Todd Oldham shares his passion for mid–century modern homes with over 72 do–it–yourself projects for anyone who loves crafts and longs to add character to every corner of their home.
Each project is charted through step–by–step photos and instructions until the fabulously mod end. Other projects include home–computer face–lifts, Xerox wallpaper, aluminium lighting fixtures, and cosy shoe–storage systems. In additional to Todd's brilliantly engineered projects, the book comes complete with a tutorial on modern home design in the form of sidebars and short essays throughout –everything from that now–famous Eames chair to the case–study houses of the 1950s.
Handmade Modern promises to revolutionise the way the reader looks at his or her own home and capacity to beautify a space. Chic, accessible, and fun, this is the achievable new look of modern home design.
Customer Reviews:
Review: Hand Made Modern.......2007-08-07
Designer Todd Oldham, founder of Todd Oldham Studio in New York and host of the Bravo television series "Top Design," provides more nifty project ideas and DIY help in his 2005 book titled Handmade Modern: Mid-Century Inspired Projects for Your Home. Oldham's book contains more than 72 step-by-step projects inspired by mid-century modern aesthetics. Interspersed along with an array of design plans; Oldham's book contains a number of succinct bios on such prominent designers as Isamu Noguchi, Alexander Girard and Charles and Ray Eames.
Oldham is well known for his contributions to the world of accessible design and has often struck me as a gifted mentor and educator. On first review,Oldham's book fulfills expectations with it's vivid "mod-podge" design and brilliantly conceived projects. Upon closer inspection however, Handmade Modern falls short of its expected accessibility with vague instructions and the absence of a much needed list of tools and materials for each project.
From a design prospective Todd Oldham's book is a bit of a let down. Ultimately, the book exists to inform the reader, so how the book does this should be considered most critically. Aesthetically, the book is pleasing and the form is consistent, but unfortunately it falls short in its function.
Copyright © 2007 Of My Own Design, Josh Crain. All Rights Reserved.
Disappointing..........2007-07-12
I'm a huge Todd Oldham fan but, over all, but this book is very disappointing. A lot of the projects seem complicated and/or expensive (also, I think the prices he lists for some of the supplies are too low, making some projects even more expensive than they seem). Given the cost of materials and tools, some things just don't seem worth making. I wish there were more simple, clever ideas for adding Modern design to your home, that don't require a lot of money, skill, tools, or a work space. The instructions and photos are sometimes confusing or incomplete, making them hard to follow. The one thing I like about this book is that Oldham talks about important Modern designers like Isamu Noguchi and Eva Zeisel, but I'm already familiar with their work, so this didn't teach me anything. I love Oldham's design aesthetic, but this is a very weak how-to book. Sorry, Todd!
Innovative Ideas for Hands-On Creative People.......2006-11-14
If you're a creative person who likes to get into hands on projects, this is a book for you. Each section begins with a photograph of an entire room, and the following pages used cropped images of each item with instructions on how to make them. Most of the projects do require some knowledge about construction & materials, however. Tools needed include a jigsaw, sewing machine, or a large space in which to do some of the projects. There are smaller projects though that do not require these things, and the book definitely promotes you to come up with your own creative ideas. One downside though, if you are interested in easy crafts - this isn't the book for you. Readers definitely need to understand the basics in order to find this book useful.
ok for ideas.......2006-11-05
This book was inspirational, and I love Todd Oldham but some of the projects are a little complicated for someone w/o any carpentry skills or lack of work space. I would recommend "Readymade" instead.
One of the worst edited book i've seen....Don't bother buying this book!.......2006-10-30
The goods: The projects are cool and fun to make but not for the ordinary person who does not know how to use a lot of power tools or knows how to sew. The designs of the projects are nice and are pretty up to date with the retro style.
The Bads: This has GOT to be the worst edited book i've ever seen!
In each introduction of the project, the finished item is shown. Then the step-by-step comes but the photos of each step are horribly cropped and doesn't show much. Then the last step is shown and it seems as if there is a page missing. It doesn't feel like there is a "finish" to each and every project. It doesn't show you what the item looks like when it's completed....even if it means repeating the finished photo of the project. I much rather have the "finished" item be shown at the end than at the beginning. I keep turning the pages thinking there is another step to the project....but NO! It feels as if the instructions just abruptly ends. What a waste of my time and money! Don't bother buying this book! It certainly is one of the worst edited book i've seen so far.
Book Description
In recent years, mid-century modern furniture, glass, ceramics, and textiles have become hugely popular among those who appreciate the stylish contribution these pieces make to the contemporary home. Modern Retro will inspire you to create a look that combines modern classics by such visionaries as the Eameses, Bertoia, and Aalto with thrift-store finds and the best contemporary design. Created by modern classics dealer Andrew Weaving and design commentator Neil Bingham, with photography by Andrew Wood, Modern Retro is not about slavishly recreating a period feel. Instead, it shows how to take the best designs of the 1920s through 1970s and use them throughout your home in a relaxed and individual way, allowing you to make the most of the gloriously eclectic forms, colors, and patterns available.
Customer Reviews:
Inspiring and accessible.......2002-06-14
Since I already have a few 50-60's modern pieces in my home, I purchased this book to give me a better idea of what other items were out there. The designs have great style, but seem totally achievable. Using this book as a guide and source of inspiration you could decorate your home in a comfortable yet stylish manner. Some of the pieces they show are pricey, while others are probably inexpensive flea market finds. The author gives you enough information that you could go out into the flea markets and antique/second hand shops and make some sound purchase. It is a shame the book is less than 200 pages. I would have loved to see more.
Expensive style without the costs!.......2001-12-30
This book is amazing. It teaches you to create a contemporary looking home, without the outrageous costs of designer furnishings. It tells you what to look for at thrift stores, and how to use what you already have. I would highly reccommend this book to anyone even just a little bit interested in design! It's truly great.
Inspirational book.......2000-11-15
For a book on home furnishings, this book certainly contains enough good pictures to get you inspired. It is also well researched and written and actually covers quite a lot of ground inspite of its rather small size at 144 pages. In fact, this book is so good, I only wish there was a bigger version of it, with even more wonderful examples of lovely interiors filled with retro furniture. This book covers interior styles from the Art Deco period to the 1970s. It does mention a little of the famous designers such as Noguchi, Eames, Nelson, etc., but its primary purpose is to teach you about how to achieve the modern retro look, with discussions on living rooms, kitchens, work rooms, bedrooms, bathrooms, furniture, lighting and accessories. What I find particularly useful is the list of retailers specializing in original pieces of furniture, a list of retailers and manufacturers of modern re-issues, and a list of architects and designers whose work had been featured in the book. Be warned though, that the list consists mostly of companies in the United Kingdom. This book is definitely a good buy for enthusiasts of retro furniture.
Book Description
The 1950’s house was a scientific triumph, designed in a laboratory and tested on inhabitants of all ages before being built for the masses. Never had homes been so thoroughly contemporary, with antiques and period styles entirely banished. Mid-Century Modern explores the interior decor of this seminal decade, concentrating on all aspects of a home's decoration—walls, flooring, surfaces, lighting, and, of course, furniture. Case studies examine beautiful present-day homes that exhibit mid-century style in an exemplary way, and suggest ideas for taking the 1950’s look—complete with collector's pieces—and mixing and matching it with elements from other eras.
Customer Reviews:
Great Design Ideas.......2007-09-06
This book is filled with spectacular color photos of mid-century modern home interiors. Lots of ideas here for color schemes, furniture layout and incorporating mid-century aspects into any room of your home.
Mid Century Modern.......2007-08-01
An absolutely stunning book & a must for any mid ce
ntury enthusiast. Fabulous photographs & narration.
Very inspiring.
mid-centry modern: interiors, furniture, design details.......2007-05-12
this book is very good if you are interested in retro, modern design. I highly recommend this book.
interesting but lite.......2007-01-16
Great overview of MCM style, but not as complete of descriptive as I expected.
Get the fifties look for your contemporary home.......2006-10-01
Could someone possibly put together a better tome on Mid-Century Modern interiors than this exquisite piece by Bradley Quinn? They'd have one helluva tough time trying.
This book is fairly short and slim, yet every single page and photograph has relevance. Each photograph is of some aspect of a home interior and is absolutely fantastic. Not a single wasted shot. I'm assuming that the majority of people interested in this book are admirers of 1950s decor and would like to incorporate elements of this into their homes. What is so wonderful about this book is that the pictures themselves are of contemporary homes that have been decorated in that Mid-Century style, resulting in achieving that look without appearing dated - certainly the effect that I'm striving for! You want elegant beige lounges or loud primary colored kitchens? It's all here. And you just gotta dig the living room on p.42! Wow - have red and yellow ever been used to such devastating effect in such circumstances? And this is just one example of many.
Although it's doubtful that people buy books like these for their text, I think in this case, they'll be glad they did. Quinn discusses at great length the various components that made up the Modern style, providing tremendously useful ideas for home decor. He doesn't get into tedious sociological analysis like so many of these type of books do. Instead, he goes straight to the interesting stuff - how mid-century modern arose within the history of design, the components of the architecture and the lifestyles of the homeowners back then. Each chapter is broken down into a different aspect of decor - color, materials, lighting etc. Why can't all interior design books be arranged in this way?
I can absolutely recommend this book to anyone looking for '50s ideas for their home. I doubt I'd ever need to buy another book on this topic. Unless Quinn sticks in more pictures for a second edition.
Book Description
"Modern Retro" will inspire you to combine modern classics by names such as Eames, Jacobson, and Aalto, with flea-market finds and contemporary designs. The book begins with an introduction to key design innovations of the mid-twentietn century. Ingredients of the Retro Look explores the elements of the style: furniture, lighting, textiles and rugs, ceramics, and glass. Creating the Retro Look, the third part of the book, shows how to combine these elements to create a stylish home. -This bestselling title sold over 65,000 copies in hardcover. -By mid-century experts Neil Bingham and Andrew Weaving.
Book Description
In 1850 St. Louis was the commercial capital of the West. By 1860, however, Chicago had supplanted St. Louis and became the great metropolis of the region. This book explains the rapid ascent and the abrupt collapse of the Missouri city. It devotes particular attention to the ways in which northeastern merchants fueled the rise of St. Louis. But unlike most studies of nineteenth-century cities, the book analyzes the influence of national politics on urbanization. It examines the process through which the sectional crisis transformed the role of Yankee merchants in St. Louis's development and thus triggered the fall of the first great city of the trans-Mississippi West.
Download Description
In 1850 St. Louis was the commercial capital of the West. By 1860, however, Chicago had supplanted St. Louis and became the great metropolis of the region. This book explains the rapid ascent and the abrupt collapse of the Missouri city. It devotes particular attention to the ways in which northeastern merchants fueled the rise of St. Louis. But unlike most studies of nineteenth-century cities, the book analyzes the influence of national politics on urbanization. It examines the process through which the sectional crisis transformed the role of Yankee merchants in St. Louis's development and thus triggered the fall of the first great city of the trans-Mississippi West.
Book Description
This highly praised celebration of '50s design recalls the wonders of boomerang-shaped coffee tables, the funky curvaceousness of biomorphic furniture, the industrial sleekness of cool metals, and other design delights. "Will undoubtedly foster a new appreciation of furniture from the '50s."--
Chicago Sun-Times.
125 4-color photographs and 100 black-and-white photographs.
Customer Reviews:
In the Top 5 Mid Century Modern books I've read!.......2007-03-11
Excellent text as well as photos. It has been a collector's reference for me for years now.
Highly recommended.
MODERN 1950'S DESIGN.......2006-02-28
This is a wonderful coffee table book, a joy to browse through. It is profusely illustrated and contains a wealth of information.
If you like modern design I also suggest to visit the wonderful online archive about George Nelson at WWW.GEORGENELSON.ORG and also the museum archive from Verner Panton at WWW.VERNERPANTON.COM
Designers of the 50's.......2004-06-05
My sister has just bought a 1950's ranch home with some original features. I was hoping this book would help celebrate the house and give some ideas as to decor. Instead, it is a good overview of the furniture designers who influenced the furniture of the time. It's nice, but not what I was looking for, which was the physical living space/furnishings of the middle class of the 50's.
Mid-century is coming back strong!.......2002-10-25
Not that it ever really went away, but it appears that the GEN-X crowd is interesting in filling their lofts, condos, etc. with a touch of class and history. Those in the design know have always favored the elements of design that existed in the 50's and 60's, like they say good design is truly timeless. It would have been nice to see more coverage on DUNBAR and Edward Wormley.
This is a great book - buy it!
Stunning.......2000-11-23
Simply beautiful. Absolutely darling photos. Fabulous work.
Book Description
Say "New England" and you likely conjure up an image in the mind of your listener: the snowy woods or stone wall of a Robert Frost poem, perhaps, or that quintessential icon of the region--the idyllic white village. Such images remind us that, as Joseph Conforti notes, a region is not just a territory on the ground. It is also a place in the imagination.
This ambitious work investigates New England as a cultural invention, tracing the region's changing identity across more than three centuries. Incorporating insights from history, literature, art, material culture, and geography, it shows how succeeding generations of New Englanders created and broadcast a powerful collective identity for their region through narratives about its past. Whether these stories were told in the writings of Frost or Harriet Beecher Stowe, enacted in historical pageants or at colonial revival museums, or conveyed in the pages of a geography textbook or Yankee magazine, New Englanders used them to sustain their identity, revising them as needed to respond to the shifting regional landscape.
Customer Reviews:
Imagining New England a Masterful Historical Exploration .......2005-06-13
Imagine New England and one thinks of rocky beaches, bucolic towns, grassroots democracy, intelectual, and progressive ideals. Imagine New England and one wants to be taken back to a purer, simpler, and more ideal time; a better life of white houses and steeple churches where one is apart of the history of who are and want to be as Americans and patriots.
In "Imagining New England," Joseph Conforti deconstructs the creation of the regional identify of New England in exquisite historical detail. In a blend of history and sociology, Professor Conforti searches for the "real" New England. The New England he had heard of but not seen or experienced as child growing up in the most un-New England of New England of cities, Fall River.
This book is a substantial contribution to American history. New England, the cultural invention, the concept, represents the best we want to be as Americans. It is a concept the country and the region itself continually reach for as an anchor to our roots despite the fact that the region itself long ago left it behind. Joseph Conforti captures the essence of this complex identity, both real and manufactured.
Superb overview of the "idea" of New England.......2003-09-23
This is an exceptionally well researched and beautifully written book which, for me, opened up all kinds of new ideas about the nature of "region" and "place" in general, and New England in particular. I was fascinated from the earliest section describing how the "second generation" in New England inherited the region from their parents and tried to "reinvent" the place for their own purposes, all the way to the wonderful discussion of Frost and the evolution of Yankee magazine. Conforti develops the theory that the locus of New England moved from Boston, with a brief recapture by Plymouth, on to Connecticut and now to northern New England. (Anybody see the Boston Globe magazine last week about "Magnetic North"? It fits perfectly into Conforti's theme.) What happened to Lawrence and Fall River and the immigrant population; you'll have to read to find out. If you love New England, this book is highly readable, profound, and worth the price!
Book Description
The bold shapes and startling patterns on dinnerware of the late 1940s, 1950s, and 1960s are displayed in over 480 dazzling color photographs. Much of the best work of six leading pottery manufacturers, Ak-Sar-Ben Pottery, Denwar Ceramics, Iroquois China Company, Laurel Potteries of California, Royal China Company, and Stetson China Company, is shown and described in detail. The dinnerware shapes, including Bantu, Casual, Futura, Holiday, Impromptu, and Scandia, produced by these important manufacturers are well represented to attract collectors today. An engaging scholarly text is filled with new research about the companies and their wares, grading guidelines, informative tables, detailed endnotes, and an extensive bibliography. Current market values are provided in the captions. This dinnerware is an exciting gallery of mid-century design.
Book Description
Explore the stylish tableware that graced the dinner tables and sideboards, the kitchen cupboards and cocktail cabinets of the '50s, '60s, and '70s.
Books:
- Automated Lighting: The Art and Science of Moving Light in Theatre, Live Performance, Broadcast, and Entertainment
- Baby Scrapbooks: Ideas, Tips, and Techniques for Baby Scrapbooks (Memory Makers)
- Bangalore Tiger
- Bites
- Canon EOS Digital Rebel XTi/400D Digital Field Guide
- Cold River Spirits: The Legacy of an Athabascan-Irish Family from Alaska's Yukon River
- Cooking from Quilt Country : Hearty Recipes from Amish and Mennonite Kitchens
- Devil's Playground
- Digital Video for Beginners: A Step-by-Step Guide to Making Great Home Movies (Lark Photography Book)
- Digital Wedding Photography: Capturing Beautiful Memories
Books Index
Books Home
Recommended Books
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- The Passing of Armies: An Account Of The Final Campaign Of The Army Of The Potomac
- ANALOG - Science Fiction Science Fact - Volume104, number 13 - mid-December 1984: The Didactics of M
- Primate Behavior: Field Studies of Monekys and Apes, 2 Volumes.
- Brothers: The Wwii Letters of William and Charles Roseberry
General
| Architecture
| Professional & Technical
| Subjects
| Books
Ranches: Design Ideas for Renovating, Remodeling, and Building New (Updating Classic America)
Modernism Reborn: Mid-Century American Houses
Ranch House Style
Eichler: Modernism Rebuilds the American Dream
Case Study Houses: 1945-1966 (Taschen Basic Architecture)
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