Retreats: Handmade Hideaways to Refresh the Spirit

Rating:
Summary: a fair book
Review: A great coffee table book but it dosen't include any plans for building a retreat yourself. It isn't a do-it yourself type of book but it is informative and has great pictures.

Rating:
Summary: Great but not what I was looking for
Review: Although the book and information is helpful and thoroughly useful, this is not what I was looking for. I am having a hard time finding - a social area - party area - for outdoors to build along side of the pool. We find we need an (approx 25 x 12) area for indoor/outdoor use when we entertain.

Rating:
Summary: Dreamy but not as helpful as we wanted
Review: We have been searching for vacation home books as we plan our own, and this one, while handsome, was a bit of a disappointment. I love to sit and dream with great photos of retreats, but we couldn't relate to many of those shown here. Still, this is a nice little book. I highly recommend another new book called Second Home, which is large and colorful and mixes tours of real homes around the country (everything from oceanside homes and lake cottages to mountain cabins) with practical tips on finding the right location for us, and on building, decorating, remodeling, and so on. My husband and I keep grabbing Second Home away from each other as we go from picture to picture. (We found Second Home at Border's, but I now see that amazon stocks it. I don't know why it hasn't turned up on amazon's recommendations or "new and notable" lists yet.)