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What's Wrong With This House? A Practical Guide To Finding A Well Designed Sustainable Home

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Too many people live in badly designed houses and we want to change that.

Too many houses have rooms that don’t get used, kitchens that are hard to work in, living rooms that are difficult to furnish, and front entry spaces with no closets. There are supersized houses and those that, in spite of their actual size, feel too small and cramped.

What’s Wrong With This House? is a practical guide to avoiding these problems. Based on the Slow Home design philosophy, it offers practical, down-to-earth design advice that focuses on the substance of the way a house works rather than on its superficial appearance. Using example projects from their many years of architectural practice, John Brown and Matthew North show you how to evaluate the design quality of your home and make it simple to live in and light on the environment.

135 pages, Paperback

First published April 15, 2011

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54 people want to read

About the author

John Brown

1,607 books4 followers
There is more than one author with the same name in the Goodreads database. This profile contains several publications for different John Browns.

See also:
John Brown, c.1610-1679, Christian books
John Brown, Minecraft
John Brown, trivia
John Brown, 1830-1922
John Brown, 1784-1858
John Brown, 1810-1882, Scottish physician
John Brown, 1797-1861, geographer
John Brown, 1800-1859
John Brown, 1778-1848
John Brown, 1715-1766
John Brown, Goodreads author
John Brown, 1944-2006
John Brown, Goodreads author
John Brown, chess
John Brown, c.1810-1876
John Brown, active 1806-1823, English historian
John Brown travel author circa 1950s

And:
John Brown Jr.
John Brown of Haddington

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5 stars
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4 stars
9 (21%)
3 stars
12 (29%)
2 stars
3 (7%)
1 star
1 (2%)
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
Profile Image for Pamela.
175 reviews8 followers
August 2, 2017
Essentially a very high-end pamphlet for HouseBrand builders and their philosophies on home design, but still one of the clearest and most interesting books on home design, layout and home buying I've ever read. Most of the information is conveyed through fictionalized conversations with potential home-buyers, making this the Celestine Prophecy of residential architecture, I guess. (really guessing since I've never read the Celestine Prophecy)

This is definitely a book I will have alongside A Pattern Language to help me 'read' houses and layouts in the future.
Profile Image for Nathan.
38 reviews1 follower
November 8, 2017
Great primer on the slow home concept

This is a great primer on the slow home concept. It contains three “case studies” that introduce the principles and show how they are applied in particular instances to create more livable spaces.

My only complaint is that I wish there was a follow on book that went deeper (like a textbook) on how to apply these principles yourself in more circumstances.
Profile Image for Sarah.
2,134 reviews
February 22, 2018
A short book by two architects about good residential design. Amazing and trajectory-changing. Recommended.
75 reviews1 follower
June 10, 2021
Wonderful read

I have learned more on this subject than I thought I would. I followed these gentlemen for quite awhile now.
Profile Image for Kristin Ely.
66 reviews
November 2, 2023
Appreciated the principles shared but the storytelling style wasn't my favorite.
8 reviews1 follower
May 12, 2025
Fantastic little book. I used it and the Slow Home videos on Youtube to design and build two houses.
11 reviews
June 24, 2015
Informative

Having just bought my first house, the advice from this book was indispensable to me. I'm glad I started reading it while I was looking around, it helped me learn the language of home design and gave me a sense of what to look for when evaluating a house.
Profile Image for Kathryn.
5 reviews
January 4, 2018
Quick, simple, straight-forward read. Incredibly informative and rewarding. Love it! I'll refer back to it time and time again, I'm sure.
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews

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