Welcoming home

As a principal architect at the Minnesota-based firm SALA Architects Inc., Mahady considers the aspects of home design that are pleasing to the senses and make people feel comfortable. Her mission is to explore the physical spaces that create this welcoming feeling. Most chapters cover Minnesota homes designed by SALA and include discussions and images of specific areas and rooms. Mahady contrasts the historical use of home spaces with how space is used today, as illustrated by beautiful photographs of architectural details. She also includes floor plans for nearly every home. In a conversational style, she shares a lot of insights into home design. VERDICT This book will serve as a design reference source for those building, remodeling, or redesigning their homes and looking for inspiration. The text is easy to read and offers a thoughtful analysis of traditional home spaces.-Valerie Nye, Santa Fe Univ. of Art and Design Lib., NM (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

These buildings seem to have lost the connection to our human selves and bodies. Yet we crave this connection and find something sorely missing in buildings that lack it. We need to rediscover and understand the links between our bodies and buildings. We can then use those discoveries in the design of our homes. This volume is a study of how houses speak to us, what messages they send, and how we can come to better understand what they are saying. We will examine how human beings experience space and built form, with an eye to understanding the spatial experiences that form our own preferred personal patterns. We can use these lessons to create homes that are more responsive to all our needs for shelter-physical, psychological, and spiritual. And we can become more aware of our roles in caring for the earth, as we build and dwell on it. Excerpted from Welcoming Home: Creating a House that Says Hello by Michaela Mahady All rights reserved by the original copyright owners. Excerpts are provided for display purposes only and may not be reproduced, reprinted or distributed without the written permission of the publisher.