Cabins

by Stiles, David R.; Stiles, Jeanie

• ISBN13: 9781552095645
• ISBN10: 1552095649
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2001-03-01
• Publisher: Firefly Books Ltd

Summary

"Clear, practical book ... full-color photos help do-it-yourselfers realize their dreams." -- Log Homes IllustratedThe best-selling Cabins is back in print, at the same great value of its original price. This authoritative how-to title gives readers all the information they need to build their own cabin, including: A useful list of essential questions to consider during the planning process Types of cabin construction, such as pole built, stick built, post and beam, stone, cordwood, wood siding, and the advantages of each Site preparation, foundations, windows and doors, ladders and stairs, insulation, roofing, electricity, water systems and heating Essential information on log cabins Cabin designs and their advantages Furnishings and accessoriesConstruction methods are clearly illustrated in meticulous line drawings and precise plans with measurements. Cut-away cross-sections and exploded diagrams give the builder the true perspective and detail needed to obtain the best result, allowing readers to get the most enjoyment out of their newly built wilderness retreat.

Author Biography

David Stiles is a designer/builder and together, with his wife Jeanie, has authored fifteen books, including Sheds: The Do-It-Yourself Guide Revised Edition (Firefly 1998), The Treehouse Book (which won the ALA Notable Children's Book Award), and Playhouses You Can Build (Firefly 1999). A graduate of the Pratt Institute and the Academy of Fine Arts in Florence, Italy, David is the winner of two awards from the New York Planning Commission for his designs for The Playground for All Children.

David and Jeanie's articles have appeared in several magazines and newspapers including House Beautiful, Better Homes and Gardens, Country Living, Home Mechanix, Rebecca's Gardens, and The New York Times. They have appeared on numerous television programs, including Lifetime Television Our Home and the Discovery Channel's Home Matters shows. They divide their time between New York City and East Hampton, N.Y. where they live in a barn which they renovated themselves.

Table of Contents

Foreword	7	(9)
Introduction	9	(6)
Cabin Planning	15	(8)
Types of Cabin Construction	23	(20)
Pole Built Cabins	24	(3)
Stick Built Cabins	27	(2)
Post and Beam Cabins	29	(1)
Stone Cabins	30	(2)
Cordwood Cabins	32	(2)
Wood Siding	34	(9)
Cabin Construction	43	(64)
Hand Cart	46	(4)
Site Preparation	50	(1)
Foundations	51	(8)
Windows and Doors	59	(12)
Ladders and Stairs	71	(6)
Insulation and Roofing	77	(7)
Electricity	84	(4)
Water	88	(3)
Plumbing & Sanitary Systems	91	(5)
Heating	96	(11)
Log Cabins	107	(32)
Log Joints	109	(3)
Cutting Your Own Logs	112	(5)
Working with Logs	117	(7)
Two-Bedroom Log Cabin	124	(15)
Cabin Designs	139	(50)
Helen's Writing Cabin	139	(9)
Pyramid Cabin	148	(7)
A-Frame Cabin	155	(11)
Pole Built Cabin	166	(8)
Timber-Framed Guest Cabin	174	(3)
Lakeside Cabin	177	(3)
Japanese Moongazing Cabin	180	(4)
Mediterranean Cabin	184	(5)
Outfitting a Cabin	189	(34)
Classic Cabin Accessories	211	(7)
Protecting Your Cabin	218	(5)
Bibliography	223	(1)
Sources	224	(5)
Index	229	(4)
Notes	233

Excerpts

Foreword by Don Metz, architectIn North American culture, the cabin holds a unique place in our collective consciousness. Enshrined in the best traditions of grassrooted nostalgia, the cabin symbolizes those bedrock frontier virtues of self-reliance, sturdiness, simplicity, humility and ---by inference -- honesty. By its very lack of pretension, the cabin connotes a purity of life whose loss we yearn to recall. As a genre, it stands at the moral center of a particularly American ethos defined by a cast of characters as diverse as Abe Lincoln, Davy Crockett and Henry David Thoreau.During the colonial era, the cabin was home on much of the frontier, and is still remembered in folklore, song and verse as a safe and cozy haven. Today, the notion of the cabin as Home Sweet Home persists in literature and film. Whether in the mountains, on the prairie or by the lake, it remains a symbol of all that we value.Today, the cabin has become the place we get away to when the place we're in has worn us out, a retreat from anxiety, a place dedicated to renewal. From the moment we lift the latch, push open the door and inhale that smoky-creosote-camphor cabin scent, we are altered for the better. More than a home away from home, the cabin reminds us of how -- we like to think -- life used to be lived in simpler times. It provides us with an opportunity to be closer to nature, and closer still to one another. The cabin is where we go to replace the hum of technology with the buzzing of insects, where cyberspace is out of place, where a mouse still has two ears and four legs. The cabin is a simple, sacred place where food and drink always taste better, where music sounds brighter, where evenings with loved ones linger longer into pleasure, where sleep is deep and dawn is fresh with wonders we've elsewhere forgotten.Cabins seeks to address not only the practical issues involved in the design and building of a cabin, but also to encourage the impulse. Life is long, but need it be so hectic?Imagine: After a long drive into nightfall, you step out of your car onto familiar footing -- not asphalt, not concrete -- but the stuff of millennial forests and plains and shorelines, the earth itself. You stretch your tired body, and you know immediately that every traveled mile was worth it as long as the trip ended here. Within moments of your arrival, it seems as if a blanket of peacefulness has gently covered you. An owl calls from a distant treetop, the same hoot-hoot, hoot-hoooot you remember from the last time -- welcome back. You breathe the night in deeply and look up at the stars. How could you forget they could be so dazzlingly bright? And the pines, the fragrance -- the scent of sage or the salty air.You drag your duffel bag up onto the porch and reach for the key hidden in the abandoned wren's nest above the door. The lock has its eccentricities, but even in the dark, you know how to coax it open; after all you installed it yourself. When the groceries have been put away and the lamps are lit low, you light a fire. And as you sit back in that comfy, old chair and look into the lazily flickering flames, you can't begin to imagine what life would be like without the elemental pleasures of a cabin.