Restoring Your Historic House: The Comprehensive Guide for Homeowners Hardcover – December 10, 2019

This book is not for sissies! This is an extremely comprehensive reference for restoring a historic home from foundation to finish.If you want something to teach you what goes into restoring a historic home from top to bottom, that is honest about all the pitfalls, expenses, and joys of fixing up a classic home, this is for you.If you’re looking for a pretty coffee table book that makes breathing life into 100+ year-old home look like a walk in the park, keep shopping!Owning this book will save you thousands of dollars of mistakes that you could make by not understanding everything that needs to go into a comprehensive renovation. It does not sugarcoat the difficulties in managing a large project and will help you decide which things you should do yourself and which things you should really leave to the experts.The author has shared everything from the big picture to the most mundane details involved in a classic restoration, and is very candid about things that went right, and also some things that could’ve gone a lot better. Ultimately, you can really see that his goal is to save other homeowners money and time by sharing his own experience in words and in photos.I have restored more than one old house and this is one of the best reference books I have ever had.I am about to embark on a restoration of an 1885 Queen Anne Victorian and I am looking forward to going into the project with even more knowledge than I already have about the process from start to finish.Highly, highly recommended.

This is a must have book for everyone interested in historic houses and their loving and careful restoration. Profusely illustrated.

This book won't exactly teach you step by step to do to repair on a historic home. What it does provide are alot of tips and foundational knowledge about how historic homes were built, what to look for when planning rehabilitation, best practices, and good examples of historic rehabilitations. I read this book in it's entirety and wish I had read something like this prior to some of my own work. Examples like how gypsum being different then lime based plasters. I do wish a bit more information was available on slate roofing and resolving structural support issues that might effect the historical appearance of a space (ex I have 20+ ft span ceilings and the only thing I can think of is running steel or wood support beams jacked up across the ceiling of my kitchen). Overall I enjoyed the book and is worth a read.

I cannot say enough great things about this book! Well written, beautiful photos but the best part is the information - straight forward, realistic and brimming with great ideas on restoring your historic home while maintaining character. We are 2 years in to the restoration of our 1880 Folk Victorian home and while we've learned a lot on our own this book has given us so many more ideas and reminded us that we can make the most of our home, modernize it and still maintain its historic integrity. Currently working on a bathroom reno and have already made some changes to preserve its history. A big thank you to the author for taking the time to put this book together. I can't wait to share it with my local historic preservation group.

"Restoring Your Historic House" is not a detailed DIY how-to-book -- there are other books for that. However, this book provides excellent insight to the construction designs, techniques and, most importantly, advice in meeting the challenges of restoring/maintaining a historic home. The book is well illustrated, and easy to read--not perplexingly technical. Owning and restoring a historic residence is not for the faint-of-heart -- "Restoring Your Historic House" is a must for anyone considering or already owns an older home. Strap on your tool belt!

Beautiful book! Photos are great, relevant, informative. This book is like a text book. Having restored a Victorian 30 years ago, this book covers so many problems we ran into and more we were lucky enough not to. Bought as a gift for son-in-law, who is buying old house. Once I heard him talking about taking front porch facade down, and putting pillars up oh! and ripping off cantilever (interior stairs landing) to relocate stairs ?!?!? taking with it a huge 4x5 foot tall stained glass window...I knew I had to get him this book. Hopefully his remuddling will be minimal!