Ranches: Design Ideas for Renovating, Remodeling, and Building New 
asked by ladyrunner on November 13, 2006 1:56 AM
The ranch can be found everywhere on both coasts and in America's heartland, too. The ranch is simple, functional, and unassuming. But it can look dated. What homeowners are rediscovering about ranches is just how affordable and flexible they can be. This book provides a fresh set of eyes with which to look at the ranches we live in — and the ones we're thinking of buying (or building). It's rich with ideas and inspiration, featuring over 250 color photos and drawings, and more than 20 examples of updated homes and ranches built from scratch.
Reviews
0%
0%
I sent this book to my brother who is restoring a 40-year-old Ranch house. He's really found it inspirational and I've enjoyed looking through it too. Here in the Atlanta area, the old Ranch houses are in danger. McMansions and their greedy, tasteless developers would have them eliminated. Yes, most of the Ranch survivors are unremarkable upon first glance but the ideas behind them--well explained in this book--are wonderful and they are certainly built of better materials and with more care than the slapped-together structures of today. Of course a weakness of the Ranch house is that like the McMansion of today it was mostly built by developers out for a dime. The pages here show the potential of the Ranch. There are some lovely rennovations, beautifully photographed. There's a good history lesson on the Ranch and its architectural and cultural sources too. I heartilly recommend this book for Ranch owners and architectural historians.
reviewed by perfectstorm on November 21, 2006 2:48 PM
0%
0%
The common ranch house was developed shortly after World War II. The design fit the needs and desires of the returning servicemen and the workers leaving the wartime industries for traditional employment.
The ranch style house had several new design concepts. Typically they were built somewhat remote from the downtown area, this was the era of the automobile. They were very well made, and designed to be easy to expand (thanks to the coming Baby Boom). The building lots of the time tended to be quite large, with plenty of room in the back yard.
Many of these homes, built in the 1950's or early sixties are available at quite good prices. In addition, with a house over fifty years old, many states and localities give preferential treatment in taxes, loan guarantees or other advantages to remodelling, renovating or updating an existing structure.
This book looks at a series of ranch style homes that have been updated to meet the needs of their current owner. This is a beautifully illustrated idea book. It is filled with ideas that ranch remodellers have used to update their homes. And while some of these ideas are expensive, so is moving into a new larger home.
The ranch style house had several new design concepts. Typically they were built somewhat remote from the downtown area, this was the era of the automobile. They were very well made, and designed to be easy to expand (thanks to the coming Baby Boom). The building lots of the time tended to be quite large, with plenty of room in the back yard.
Many of these homes, built in the 1950's or early sixties are available at quite good prices. In addition, with a house over fifty years old, many states and localities give preferential treatment in taxes, loan guarantees or other advantages to remodelling, renovating or updating an existing structure.
This book looks at a series of ranch style homes that have been updated to meet the needs of their current owner. This is a beautifully illustrated idea book. It is filled with ideas that ranch remodellers have used to update their homes. And while some of these ideas are expensive, so is moving into a new larger home.
reviewed by titanium7 on November 24, 2006 3:28 AM