Search results for ""Author Tina Skinner""

Here are enough projects to keep even the most productive do-it-yourselfer occupied through several seasons of warm weather. This book contains over 30 projects and ideas for ways to expand your living space outdoors. Beautiful color pictures illustrate many of the projects, and more than 130 illustrations and step-by-step instructions make it easy to create these backyard treasures. With this book you can make decks, shade shelters, gazebos, work and storage areas, decorative arbors, planter boxes, garden borders, comfortable benches, a swing, a picnic table, doghouses, and a bluebird nesting box.

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A beautiful gallery of luscious backyards and exquisite entryways will inspire you to terrace and sculpt your lawn. Step-by-step instructions will walk you through the process of creating these showpieces using concrete products widely available on today's landscaping market. Over 250 color images display outdoor kitchens, front entry courtyards, water features, patio settings, flower beds, and raised seating that provide curb appeal and creature comforts to the residential environment. The potential for enhancing and reshaping the landscape is as limitless as the imagination, and this book serves as an excellent launching point. Simple, clear graphics clarify the process of retaining wall construction, making it a wonderful tool for training and inspiring amateur and professional landscapers alike.

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A delightful story chronicles the adventures of a wren as he seeks to build the ultimate birdhouse. Learn about architectural style coast to coast in a childishly charming book that is a blast of color from front to back. Expose your child to concepts of classic design as diverse as Georgian Revival and log cabin, Art Deco and Arts & Crafts. Children will see their environment, whether their own home or the town they are driving through, in a whole new light. This is a book you'll want to read aloud together time and again. Early reader–ages 5-8.

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Includes a wonderful circular patio centered around a firepit, to a demonstration walkway that illustrates how to lay basketweave, running brick, and herringbone patterns, this book is the perfect resource for anyone who wants to undertake a great home improvement project. Learn how to lay the groundwork, study details for edging and popular paver designs, and finish up like a pro. A special chapter details the process of laying a permeable paving surface, an increasingly popular alternative in today’s eco-conscious world. Clear photos detail every step in the process, and a gallery of more than 100 finished projects will inspire you to get to work. All you need is the muscle.

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Today's top homes include spa-scale, master bath suites that serve up far more than the traditional 10-minute morning routine. Luxury bath suites include whirlpool tubs, multi-faceted showers, soaking tubs, and, above all, space. Tremendous attention is being lavished on the design of baths where you'll want to linger . When you do leave, you feel more relaxed, beautiful, and prepared for the world than when you entered. A tour through these pages, filled with over 300 color images, will inspire designers and homeowners setting out to create their own in-home spas.

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Enjoy an incredible collection of 128 images showing the fleeting, effervescent beauty of young geisha apprentices captured over a century ago. This keepsake, fan-shaped book captures a moment now lost to history, when Japanese girls were indentured as young as 6. Dressed like dolls, they were paraded through parties and celebrated for their beauty, charm, and innocence, all the while learning the music, dance, conversational, and gaming skills expected in a master of their craft. Here is a wonderful opportunity to see these girls in the glory of their colorful regalia, posing before a newly introduced invention, the camera. This treasury of hand-tinted postcard and real-photo images is a unique book you will treasure forever.

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For those uninitiated into the 21st century world of concrete, this book will serve as a real eye-opener. For those in the concrete, landscaping, and interior design industries, this is a beautiful portfolio of the possible. More than 200 sumptuous color images take you on a journey into the ever-evolving world of decorative concrete. Explore techniques that recreate favorite paving options for hardscaping projects around the pool, patio, driveway and entryway and walkways, as well as the broad palette of color and textures available. This book is packed with ideas for adding curb appeal to the front of your home, and luxury and easy maintenance beauty to the backyard. Explore hundreds of properties from the comfort of an easy chair, while planning your value-enhancing home improvements.

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This is the ultimate guide to creating an outdoor oasis in your very own backyard. Hundreds of images illustrate creative ideas for turning a simple lawn into a fresh-air room. Topics covered include using landscaping to create "walls" and a sense of space. Design possibilities of wood, poured concrete, brick, tile, gravel, natural stone, and concrete pavers are explored. Consider decorating loggias, patios, courtyards, covered porches, decks, lanais, and rooftops, as well as temporary structures. Learn how to furnish an outdoor room. A large section on outdoor kitchens provides ideas for outdoor design's hottest trend. Designers, contractors, architects, and homeowners will love the multitude of ideas for fashioning amazing outdoor spaces.

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This is the most comprehensive assembly of historic geisha images ever compiled in a book. Over 500 exquisite views - drawn from postcards produced primarily between 1900 and 1940 - illustrate the rarified world of Japan's now-extinct licensed pleasure districts. Soon after the West pried open Japan's doors in 1853, stories about Japan began to circulate wildly through Victorian societies. Geisha quickly attained folkloric status as both imagery, widely traveled stage productions, and titillating novels spread their fame, and postcards bearing their images circulated the globe. Enter a world dripping in symbolism, elevated by accomplishment. For the Westerner, it is a world of exotic misconceptions, characterized by a male fantasy of the submissive Asian beauty devoted to his pleasure. Equally exotic to the average Japanese, Geisha embody the highest level of a proud culture. Geisha are accomplished in music, letters, and the intricate art of the tea ceremony. Epitomizing feminine grace and beauty, geisha are always carefully adorned, every hair oiled into place, and every step and gesture perfectly executed. The comprehensive text introduces historical background about the talented geisha entertainers and other women who were indentured in virtual slavery within the famed and idealized "Flower and Willow World." High-class prostitutes, as well as lowly tea servers are pictured, and the life of early 20th century women in Japan is explored. The symbolic kimono, poses, and accouterments of the women photographed are explained in captioning that will help to open the eyes of many Westerners to Japanese culture, and help to debunk misconceptions regarding the status and nature of geisha. For the Japanese historian, this is the best source of original imagery ever assembled within two covers about Geisha. For anyone with even a casual interest in this utterly unique culture, this book will prove a captivating page turner. .

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The ultimate indulgence, this home improvement is sure to make you the envy of your neighbors. A hot tub or spa, whether in a sunroom, patio, or under a pavilion, provides the perfect escape. Soothing jets, long soaks, and lovely vistas add up to improved quality of life. Herein is a colorful portfolio of nearly 200 custom-made spas filled with inspiring ideas for your own personal oasis of mental health. Crafted by members of the Master Pools Guild, these spas embody the best in stone, tile, concrete, and brickwork married to the latest technological gadgetry -- remote controls, decorative lighting, and outdoor sound systems. Moreover, many double as water fountains, waterfalls, and catch basins for rambling streams. Here is a big, beautiful look at one small landscaping or interior feature that is guaranteed to improve your life.

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More than 2,000 trademarks, logos, and typefaces display the creative mindset of the 1950s. These marks include clothing companies, drugstore products, alcohol and cigars, and food and dairy products. The marks are arranged numerically by registration number from the U.S. Patent and Trade Office, with the USPTO's unique coding system indicating color and shading. Designers, artists, and entrepreneurs will find inspiration for new designs and marketing concepts here while enjoying this eclectic collection.

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After many requests for a book about clothing labels we decided to put one together featuring a wonderful gallery of labels for artists, textile manufacturers, graphic designers, and just plan old ordinary people to enjoy. This book includes a little bit of history and technical information as well as a diverse selection of lovely labels to look at and be inspired by. There are labels dating back to the turn of the century, as well as a current roster of famous names and contemporary designs. A wonderful introduction gives a comprehensive overview of the history of garment labels and manufacturing techniques. A resource guide lists many of today's leading clothing-label manufacturers. After leafing through this book, you'll never take your clothing labels for granted again! This is an excellent, inspirational resource for fashion designers and historians.

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Enter more than 250 of the most beautiful guestrooms in the world, and dream up wonderful ideas for your own sleeping quarters. Herein lie all manner of inspiration for every sort of bedroom, from lofty hideaways under slanting eaves, to enormous, two-room master suites. You'll get ideas for bedspreads and pillows, curtains and upholstery, wallpaper and window seats, and ideas for incorporating antiques or a favorite collection into your decor. An amazing showcase of beds, from four-posters fit for a king, to unique, handcrafted antiques in all their intricate glory. Plus ideas for incorporating extra features like whirlpool tubs and fireplaces into the sleeping chamber.

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This inspiring compendium of beautifully designed and crafted fences and gates will inspire homeowners and handymen to get right to work. This is a rich resource of dozens of beautifully crafted fences, any one of which could be the envy of your neighborhood. A how-to section helps you plan, plot, and execute a fence project. Included are ideas for privacy fences, fence/planter combinations, built-in seating, and arbor gates. Styles represented include fences influenced by the Arts & Crafts movement and Asian and traditional European designs. There are great ideas for providing privacy for a deck, patio, pool, or hot tub, and great gates to frame impressive entryways.

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More than 60 of today's top lighting designers from the United States and Europe are showcased here, along with up-and-coming talents. Over 300 color photos of hundreds of funky, fun, classic, far-out, retro, and whimsical designs, including chandelier and ceiling fixtures, wall sconces, and table and floor lamps are featured. This is the ultimate shoppers' guide for anyone hunting for the unique and special. An index provides contact information for each design studio. Also, items shown have suggested retail prices in the captions. This is a must-have for professional interior designers, and an invaluable tool for any homeowner shopping for something truly fabulous.

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Harrison Fisher: Defining the American Beauty is the largest picturial guide to this popular artist ever produced. Nearly 450 color and black and white reproductions of his magazine covers and book illustrations document this important artist's career. Harrison Fisher enjoyed incomparable fame from 1905 to 1920, achieving celebrity status and holding the enviable position of national beauty judge. Fisher portrayed the American woman as an outgoing, lively personality, wealthy and healthy. She rode horses, played tennis, and motored in the new automobiles while holding court for admiring men. Fisher's portrayals of such beauties added market value to dozens of novels as well as hundreds of magazines which clamored for his art on both their covers and inside pages. With Fisher's work extremely hot on the collectibles market, new and seasoned buyers alike will benefit from the advice of antiques dealer and Price Guide author Bruce Magnotti.

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Take a chronological tour of bath and powder rooms and watch as they evolved from converted closets to luxury centers for leisure and relaxation. 20th Century Bathroom Design by Kohler is an invaluable reference to the best in bathroom design during the twentieth century. More than 400 images are presented here, drawn from advertising and designer rooms created for the nation's leading plumbing manufacturer, Kohler Co. of Kohler, Wisconsin. Included are the unforgettable images from the groundbreaking advertising campaign, "The Bold Look of Kohler," as well as the wonderful artwork resulting from a century of arts patronage. That art has extended to Kohler's products as well, samplings of which are shown here, including painted designs for toilets and sinks, matching tiles, and master- crafted wooden bathroom vanities. Hundreds of the early products are pictured and identified to help homeowners and collectors identify their antique plumbing. Photos and artwork also provide a tour of bathroom design through time, portraying state-of-the-art rooms that pre-date World War II, and picturing post-war styles that scream '50s, '60s, and '70s. Plus, there's an entire gallery of contemporary bathroom design with nearly 150 photos.

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Outdoor Wood Works is a collection of ideas for improving the environment around our houses. From the fences that frame our homes to the walkways that lead to our front doors, this book explores ways in which wood can improve our little stake in the great outdoors. Hundreds of ideas are presented in full-color photographs. Permanent outdoor fixtures like benches and gazebos make the outdoors more comfortable while flower boxes, retaining walls, and other accents add beauty. There's something for everyone in this book, from play sets for the children to bird and doghouses. Ten complete project plans range from the simplest of constructions-a screen around a utility box, a mailbox stand with planter, and a bench-to more advanced projects including a chair, a picnic table, and an outdoor storage shed. Designers and homeowners alike will love this idea-filled compendium of outdoor plans and projects.

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Pure Deck-adence: A Guide to Beautiful Decks is a fantasy collection of real-life deck photos from all over the United States. From the humblest of condo balcony walkouts to the most elaborate sprawling wood structures, Pure Deck-adence explores the many possibilities of add-on outdoor home improvements. This pictorial essay explores America's fascination with outdoor living, from barbecue-centered constructions to the new immersion in hot tub culture. More than 240 full-color photographs provide a rich resource of ideas for those who dream of expanding their homes, and their horizons, with wood decks.

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Over 300 images of wine cellars immerse you into the stylish and impressive world of today’s vintage connoisseur. A wine cellar is becoming a standard feature of today’s luxury home. The ability to invest in fine wines, to age them properly, and to have them on hand for entertaining is a luxury more people can afford. This book is packed with ideas and technical information for designing safe, stylish, beautiful wine cellars. Essays by leading designers and a section detailing the proper construction of a wine cellar make this an invaluable reference.

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Enter an ultra-patriotic era of "military mood" fashions, replete in red, white, and blue. One in a series of books from Schiffer Publishing documenting fashion trends in America, this is an invaluable resource for fashion designers looking to revive and rework retro styles, for costume designers working to recreate an era, and for collectors and historians wanting to document vintage clothing. A visual treasure chest, this book offers more than 400 full-color photographs, with thousands of items of clothing, shoes, and accessories pictured, along with detailed descriptions. A guide to retail values for these items on today's market is featured as well.

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Paisley textile designs are organized into a sweeping visual survey, from orderly foulard patterns to elaborate borders, from experimental media to ornate florals; this book delves into printed and woven fabrics alike. More than 550 full-color photographs of paisley designs provide an invaluable optical reference of variations that span more than five decades of fabric design, including French and Italian couture fabrics. It is the most comprehensive pictorial guide produced on the subject.

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An incredible collection of imagery takes you on a tour of old and new log homes, offering restorers and new homebuilders alike a chance to recreate architectural traditions in a home for today's family. There's inspiration for every room inside, as well as the exteriors of structures that are part of time-honored landscapes. Examine details of log finishing and chinking, staircases, windows, doorways, and floors that work together to frame the log home lifestyle. Hundreds of photos make this a priceless reference for planning and furnishing your dream log cabin.

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Explore the rich heritage Old Europe has offered for designers of today's high-end kitchens. Enjoy rooms replete with details carefully drawn from stately homes in the Mediterranean hill towns of Provence and Tuscany, the Moorish influences of Spanish Haciendas, the elegance and extravagances of Parisian apartments, and the time-honored traditions of panelled estates of Britain. The appliances may be professional grade stainless steel, yet the hand-carved wooden corbels, wrought-iron fixtures, and the stone-cobbled floors evoke a heritage hundreds of years in the making. This luscious collection of nearly 200 images takes designers and homeowners on an inspiring tour of over 100 kitchens that will inspire your journey to import the old world's long-lasting charms and elegance into your own home.

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More than 350 photographs of historic fabric swatches explore design variations in foulards, the small motifs printed on silks and related fabrics that were intended for men’s ties and dressing gowns. Take an inspiring visual tour of designs, from the traditional to pop art, in foulard prints. An invaluable guide for the historian and student, a treasure of ideas and inspiration for designers.

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Visit treasured house museums in the lowcountry of South Carolina and Georgia, exploring the essence of ante-bellum elegance. 222 lovely color photographs guide you through the corridors of nine classically built, exquisite manor homes and the shaded pathways that wend through heirloom gardens. Experience an era long past, when wealthy planters and slaves wrested fortunes from virgin swampland to produce rice and indigo for a hungry European market. Re-discover American history as you enjoy stories of the dynastic families who built these homes, shaped the growth of the region, and were instrumental in founding the nation. This book is a wonderful souvenir for those who've explored the Lowcountry, and a wish list for those who aspire to do so.

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It costs very little to get started, the skills are easy to master, and the projects take only a few hours. You'll quickly be addicted to this enjoyable craft; and friends and family will rave about their gifts. Christmas ornaments, decorative penny rugs, pretty pouches, and floral brooches are among the featured projects. With some recycled old wool clothing, a few pretty yarns and threads, sharp scissors, and a good needle, you're on your way, and this is a portable craft that tucks in a purse and goes with you to boring meetings, hockey matches, and doctors' waiting rooms. Clear, illustrated instructions and templates will help you create dozens of fun projects.

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Meet more than 50 master wood craftsmen who reveal new designs in this book dedicated exclusively to the emerging studio furniture movement. Furniture ranges from footstools to elaborate entertainment and office centers, each exquisite and unique in its execution. Featured are craftsmen who work in local lumber they mill on their private lots alongside artists who inlay precious, exotic woods from far corners of the earth. Some celebrate the natural art in the edges and grain of wood while others contort wood into seemingly impossible balances and configurations. The vast range of imagination and craftsmanship will delight as you peruse this collection of over 400 lush images, most of them never before seen in print. You'll revisit each page time and again.

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Building a new house or planning a remodel? Here's the first place to shop for ideas. Enter more than 50 kitchens, each carefully planned and perfectly primped to inspire you. These pages are packed with professional design ideas to help you create a perfect culinary paradise. With an emphasis on fine cabinetry and built-ins, the book examines how a kitchen can be configured to maximize both visual appeal and utility. One chapter also explores other rooms furnished with custom cabinetry.

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Travel coast to coast and witness many of the country's premier decorator events. Though decorator showhouses are open to the public for a few weeks, these masterpieces are now preserved for your endless perusal. Showhouses let decorators pull out all the stops to show off their talents and resources. The organizers, notable charity organizations, reap significant revenue because people simply flock in. Homeowners and decorators come in droves to see all the wonderful ideas, paying upwards of $20 per ticket. This book offers admission to over 30 different events and highlights the work of over 150 designers featured in glorious color. Enjoy your tour!

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You will simply be blown away by the beauty of the hundreds of kitchens represented in this book. Leading designers and manufacturers share their best work in this compendium of extraordinary designs. More than 300 full-color images afford you the chance to study details for your own kitchen design projects, from cabinetry features and appliances, to color schemes, accessories, and overall room arrangement. All styles and schools of design are represented, from contemporary to traditional, from Southwestern to Old World. This is the most comprehensive portfolio book published on kitchen design in years, and an absolute bargain for those seeking inspiration from high-end designers. There is simply no other book on the market that offers readers this opportunity to tour hundreds of kitchens, all in one sitting.

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Popular artist Wallace Nutting traveled throughout New England and the United States giving lectures as minister, photographer, author, furniture maker, collector and antiquarian. Born in Rockbottom, Massachusetts, in 1861 and buried in Augusta Maine in 1941, Nutting left an amazing legacy of hand-tinted photography and published books, as well as furniture highly coveted by collectors. For the first time, Wallace's lavishly illustrated series of "Beautiful" books on his beloved New England states, have been combed for the best examples of historic architecture, sketched and photographed by Nutting in his effort to preserve these structures for future generations. Nutting's interior and exterior images of historic buildings, homes, and garden structures throughout the New England states are portrayed within these pages. In addition to beautiful exterior profiles, Nutting's explorations reveal staircases, fireplaces, entryways, furnished sitting rooms, and even bedchambers as shared with him by friends throughout the country. Important landmarks shown include popular inns, churches, and notable residences, as well as the picturesque barns and rural landscapes which have made Nutting's work such treasured keepsakes.

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Explore more than 25 finely crafted timber frame homes, inside and out. Guided by floor plans, this photographic journey takes you from an overall look at the exteriors of stately, custom-built homes, through the interiors. Whether designed to be warm and cozy, or awesome and impressive, these homes are inspiring. Pass through inviting foyers to the private worlds of timber-frame home owners. The tours include towering great rooms, dream kitchens, dens and family rooms, and the inner sanctums of master suites. Enjoy views of the open construction possible with timber frame design while perched in the loft, or gaze up the length of a two-story stone chimney. Additionally, examples of a pool house, office, barn, and workshop provide ideas for other areas where the art of post and beam can be incorporated into your property.

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Called "The Forest City" and "The Paris of the South", the city of Savannah Georgia is well-known throughout the South for its beautiful squares and parks, its magnificent architecture, and fascinating history. Over 250 vintage hand-tinted postcards will transport readers back into Savannah's past to a time when the city was a booming tourist and industry made a popular destination for travelers from around the world. Gaze at graceful Southern mansions, sprawling avenues, the imposing buildings of the cotton trade, and the moss-draped oak trees that have made Savannah known the world over as a city of elegance and beauty. Approximate dating and values will aide collectors in building their own collections of these wonderful images.

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From the outside in, explore exquisite timber frame homes at your leisure. Floor plans serve as your tour guide, while leading architectural photographers illuminate the astonishing spaces and intimate detailing of authentic homes. Each evokes the grandeur of the inherited barn-style form, while expressing the individuality of the owners who took part in designing their one-of-a-kind homes. In all, 30 homes are presented for your inspection, with imagery of exteriors, great rooms, kitchens, dining areas, intimate studies, dens, and formal living rooms, as well as spacious master suites and beautifully appointed bedrooms and baths. This book will inspire all who hope to build or furnish a unique post and beam home of their own.

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You don't have to travel beyond the backyard to experience pure luxury. This book will show you how to transform your lawn into a personal paradise. Over 400 beautiful color photographs of spectacular backyard environments feature pools, spas, and fountains. More than just water features, you'll find a wide breadth of projects that inspire and amaze. Indulge your senses with exciting ideas in backyard design, intended to pamper and please even the pickiest home owners. Realize the potential of your backyard with the power of simple landscaping, elaborate poolside structures, waterfalls, fireplaces, and more. Transform your lawn into a lavish retreat, bound to make a huge splash with friends, family, and neighbors.

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Here's a wonderful opportunity to lean back in your own private study and visit more than 200 private offices, dens, and libraries. If you are looking for design inspiration, this book is packed with ideas for floor layouts, paneling and shelving systems, storage systems, and color schemes. Whether you need to impress clients in your home or business park, there are ideas here for you. Work by leading architects and designers, as well a practical turn-key setups from manufacturers are represented, along with contact information to help you with you design and furnish your perfect office, library, or den.

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For those who dream of living in a log home, this treasure trove of images will be a welcome delight . Now in its second edition, the book has been expanded to include images of 18 new homes. The first edition inspired thousands of would-be log home builders. Nearly 50 homes are pictured in all, complete with floor plans as well as gorgeous imagery of both interiors and exteriors. This is a gold mine of visual ideas for designing, building, and decorating log homes. Study these dazzling ispaces and compare house profiles, room layouts, and decorating and furnishing ideas for great rooms, bedrooms, home offices, kitchens, and baths. This enchanting resource showcases log home living and the distinctive decorating styles that so greatly complement it.

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If you're contemplating a new pool project, and if you want it to outshine all others, this is the book for you. Here is a virtual, vicarious tour of nearly 300 spectacular swim-able waterscapes by the world's top pool builders, members of the elite Master Pool Guild. Samples of their work range from sweet little oases and brief lap pools to luxurious environments complete with waterfalls, fountains, spas, and tiki bars. Explore an endless range of shapes to complement your landscape and architecture. Experience different textures and color schemes in stone and concrete skirting, as well as plant and rock border ideas for completing your backyard environment. This is an inspiring portfolio of ideas for anyone who builds or designs pools, and an essential guide for those planning a new pool project that goes beyond the ordinary.

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If you're thinking about building a new home, you'll want to start here. This introduction to insulating concrete form (ICF) construction will open your eyes to the future. ICF construction combines man's best building materials - concrete and steel, with high-tech insulation - bringing them together in simple forms a small child can lift. Anyone with basic carpentry experience can assemble them. Concrete construction offers rock-solid homes that can withstand hurricane-force winds, drastically cut energy costs, and provide unbeatable air and sound quality, in buildings as beautiful as the designer's imagination. Tour 15 gorgeous showcase homes, complete with floor plans, which demonstrate the endless design possibilities available with concrete. Architects, contractors, and homeowners share their experiences designing, building, and living in the best-built homes available today.

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Study more than 200 inspiring designer rooms that will help you and your family create the perfect place for your children, be they brand new babies or budding teens. Explore hundreds of great furnishing and decorating ideas through more than 250 color photos of bedrooms and playrooms. Call a family meeting and compare notes on colors, furniture styles, appealing themes, and room configurations. There are rooms for princes and princesses, and for both when they come in pairs! Enjoy exciting color themes; ideas for creating rooms that grow with the child; age-appropriate accessorizing; creating more room out of little, and squeezing play and study space into sleeping quarters. As an added bonus, there are three simple do-it-yourself projects -- a princess room, a racecar room, and a jungle hideaway -- with how-to details and materials lists. Plus, there are ideas for converting a child’s room after they move away, or creating a guest room children will want to come to. There are also ideas for vacation homes, plus wonderful inspirations for playrooms.

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This incredible collection of stunning images will inspire anyone who dreams of creating their very own timber-frame home. Thirty-eight custom-built homes are featured, inside and out, complete with floor plans. Packed with 275 gorgeous color pictures, this book provides furnishing and decorating ideas, including inspirations for decorating the great room, master bedrooms, cozy sitting rooms, elegant dining rooms, and outdoor living spaces. Gorgeous kitchen photos will help you whip up your own culinary creation center. And there are lots of ideas for creating quiet escape nooks, home offices, luxurious baths, and lofty hideaways. This is a must-have for anyone who owns a timber-frame house or remodeled barn, and all who want one.

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An art form often ignored gets its due in this collection of historic prints. The abstract genre, as it has been applied to the textiles of everyday life--from upholstery fabrics and curtains to the wearable art we don daily--is explored through photographs of 300 fabric swatches from couture houses in Italy, France, and the United States. This colorful volume is a must-have for up-and-coming textile and fashion designers ready to take a lesson from their anonymous predecessors in the everyday gallery of art.

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More than 300 historic fabric samples from the mid-1920s and 1930s provide a visual textbook of design ideas prevalent during the Art Deco era. These were the everyday fabrics used for housedresses and curtains, adorned with the era's predominate geometric creations and spiced with the exotic inspirations that spurred one of the most popular artistic movements of all times. This book is an invaluable reference guide for costume historians and a treasure trove of inspiration for designers.

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They're hot, they're shiny, and they're oh-so-glamorous. The mettle of movie star wardrobes, the spark that lights brides' eyes, and the flash that marks music videos-metallic fabrics have defined glamour for half a century. This book revisits metallics past, with historic fabric swatches from Europe and Japan dating back to the 1950s, and takes us to today's top European couture houses in a visual exploration of metallics' allure. In all, 237 pictures will provide inspiration for designers and insight for fashion historians.

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Spanning more than five decades of fabric design, Plaids is an invaluable visual reference guide for designers. With more than 550 full-color photographs of printed and woven plaids, this colorful book provides a sweeping survey of plaid fabric designs, from the standard checks and gingham patterns to the farthest reaches of designers' imaginations. Special sections detail variations in plaid styles, including imitation weaves, hound's-tooth, harlequin, florals, and novelty prints. The book also includes French and Italian couture fabrics and more than 150 traditional Scottish tartans. Plaids is the most comprehensive pictorial guide ever produced on the subject.

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More than 500 images explore the free-form embroidered creations of the tribal people of India's renowned Gujarat province. Dating back 30 to 100 years, they include original garments, temple offerings, welcome banners, and second-generation quilted works that combine precious remnants for new decorative uses. These items have trickled onto the world market where they are treasured by decorators and collectors. Textile artists, designers, and ethnologists alike will delight in these examples of the boundless imaginations of itinerant tribal women who make much of little in their elaborate, mica and bead-studded creations. Abstract, geometric, floral, and religious imagery celebrates the boundless exuberance of their quest for beauty.

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Reflecting the trends of wartime, with an emphasis on the ever-changing roles of women in society, this book illustrates the movement towards more masculine styles and patriotic fashions and colors, while still representing the tailored and restrictive styles that had once dominated the lady's closet. Government rationing and limitations on everyday fabrics and textiles resulted in fashionable new creations. This book, drawn from the pages of the Sears-Roebuck catalogs, has over 400 images with thousands of items of clothing pictured. It gives the reader an insightful look at the fashions perspectives of the mid-1940s.

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