Customer Reviews
Sound ideas, Great house. 
2008-05-13
The Not So Big House was given me by a craftsman friend who had used it building his new, wonderful home.
I kept this book through my new addition / remodel project of 7 months, using it as the reference for my decisions.
The ideas are sound; easy to understand and implement. I recommend The Not So Big House to anyone embarking on a home building project who loves good design and is on a budget.
wonderful book 2008-04-06
This book was absolutely awesome. Beautifully illustrated, excellent content, and I totally agree with the idea that McMansions are not the way to go. I'd much rather have a smaller home that has been personalized to me and made beautiful than some big, cold half-empty McMansion.
Are these homes really small? 
2007-12-22
I was expecting her projects to downsize to ~1000 square feet. It felt like she was reducing large McMansions to smaller McMansions. Good photographs though!
Makes no sense to me... 
2007-11-25
"You can only sit in one chair at a time."
This was a great quote I heard about the unnecessary owning of "American houses" with too much space. In spite of the promise and premise of this book, I found practically NOTHING here to be of real value, outside of some beautiful photographs that one can find in any Home & Garden magazine. I had heard so much about it, a "bestseller" and great reviews, that I went ahead and ordered it; too bad I hadn't seen it in person before I purchased it. One look and it would have been back on the shelf, probably.
The entire book seems to be a short "essay" or "article" that was then illustrated with many unrelated large photos and small diagrams (without dimensions, I might add). The text doesn't match the photos on the same page in many cases, making it very difficult or impossible to read through. The book has been laid out with the photos as the main thing on the page, and text seems to be inserted here and there to fill up any blank space.
I never could really read the book or use it at all since I was constantly trying to figure out "what went with what." I have to agree with another comment that said this book was really just a sales & marketing effort" for her architectural firm. What else could it be? 2,000 sq. ft. is NOT a "not so big house." I won't go into anymore about that, since others have already done it and probably much better than me.
Here's two in particular that I LOVED reading:
Review by "Reginleif II" & reply by "Contented:"
Thank you BOTH so much for your hilarious and exact, on point, review and comments... I was thinking the same thing about this dratted book, wondering why - after reading nothing but "bestseller" and "glowing reviews" what exactly I was missing! Now I know... that outdoor backyard BBQ pit grilling "spotted owls" and more. Of course, I would have to draw the line at "baby seals" (and all the other endangered species you mention) but "tongue in cheek" this one had me laughing so hard I just about fell off the bed!
The whole thing, in fact. Some people would call me a "liberal," but the Bobo factor has always turned me away. Just like "Contented" said, next I too will enjoy googling "Bobos in Paradise." Thanks for an excellent way to end this Happy Thanksgiving weekend.
Honest to God, until I read some of these critiques here on Amazon, I thought I was losing my mind! I didn't see ANYTHING "small" about that house. I build houses and specialize in creating and restoring the most beautiful little houses (by the time I'm done) which are all under 1,000 sq. ft.
The one I'm in right now is 700 sq. ft. and I have a bedroom, office, large bathroom, kitchen, living room, enclosed sun room, porch and deck... the whole house is like "living in my garden" with sunlight streaming in at all hours of the day. It's really amazing, as I used to have 3,000 sq. ft. and it took a full-time cleaning lady. Now I can do it in about an hour, and I still have just about everything I need.
I also have three storage sheds, to which I've added French doors and used them as long windows on one entire side of the sheds, so they are filled with light and could be a real studio or workroom. Now that's what I call "not so big."
Heck, I had a friend and his girlfriend living in one of the sheds which was fixed up as a little cabin, even had a porta-potty inside, queen bed, shelving, pull out couch, TV, microwave, 10 ft x16 ft (160 sq. ft) w/deck, and they had everything THEY needed. And I DON'T live in California, but an hour outside of Raleigh out in the country (where the author Sarah Susanka lives).
Now that's what I call "living well in small spaces." If you have a beautiful garden, you really "live" outdoors, even if it's just looking out your window. The house is really just a space for a few functions, and the total ENVIRONMENT is what counts. The way the light falls into the room, seeing the moon and stars overhead outside your bedroom window; sitting outside on a small deck or balcony and drying off in a robe or towel... fountains, walkways, park benches, blooming trees, shrubs and flower beds... and a beautiful place to work, cook and sleep indoors; what more do you need? That's the way I, and most people I know, "really live." In the workroom or bedroom or in front of the TV or computer. When you get down to it, none of those spaces take up very much space.
Counting the view of the garden as "living space" really stretches your living AREA just by looking out French doors and windows. If you have hard paving (wood, brick, concrete, flagstone etc.) outdoors with walkways that go all around the house, the garden suddenly becomes magically accessible, and you will find yourself outside a lot more of the time. Who needs a big or "not so big" house if you can go outdoors? Even if you are indoors, adding double windows to walls and glass paned French doors extends your site line to the edge of the property or a line of screen hedges or trees, which doubles or triples the "feel" of the space you are inhabiting. It's really pretty marvelous, and this book does not address any of this.
Sight lines from inside the house mean more to the design of a structure than just the floorplan and arrangement of squares or rectangles we call "rooms." You are just moving from one box to another. It's like living in a maze, and you can hardly find your way out. Every house should be sited on it's own lot, with doors, windows, entrance and exits designed to take the entire property into account. Making sure to put in upstairs windows that allow vistas of the trees and surrounding properties changes everything; it's like "living in the trees" and enjoying the fall color and the Spring blush. It changes everything. Being able to enjoy the whole world" at your fingertips and eyesight, and hearing bird songs in the morning means a lot more than simple "square footage," no matter how much you do or don't have.
At least this is how I design and built all the little cottages I have done, and they all seem to be just perfect for one or two people, or small families without too many kids. Adding children of course changes things somewhat, but that's another discussion.
By the way, I'm a contractor, landscaper and computer programmer, and I get more conservative with each passing year. Oh, My God. Am I turning into my parents?
Thanks again to the reviewers and commentators that saw this thing in the same light I did. Made me feel "sane" again after all the b.s. in the book. Now, what do I do with it now that I purchased it? Donate it to the library? Didn't make any sense to me...
Now to find a real book on "small spaces" or write one of my own. Any suggestions?
Tremendously helpful 2007-11-14
I came across this book while looking for ideas for a major renovation, and it sure gave me some. It was by far the most helpful of all the books I uncovered, and I only wish I'd found it earlier in the design process. The author has an overall philosophy -- save by cutting back on space, and spend what you save on pleasing and efficient detail. She elaborates that philosophy with many smaller ideas and concepts. She discusses and illustrates the aesthetic principles that make an environment pleasing to the senses, and she addresses conrete design problems like how to provide for TV viewing. The kitchen counter or family dining area in a Susanka house is not cluttered with magazines and bills, for example, because she sees a mail-sorting area as one of the functional necessities that must be provided for in a well-designed house of today, and therefore just as necessary as an eating area.
This is the first of a whole suite of books Susanka has written on the not so big house. There is a certain amount of repetition in them, for sure, but she develops her themes more fully through all of them and I enjoyed them all. I was not very knowledgeable when I started, and more sophisticated readers might not find the book as helpful and exciting as I did, but I recommend it wholeheartedly to the average person who wants a homebuilding project to turn out well and isn't quite sure how to make it so.
great ideas 
2007-11-12
When describing a favorite room in the house, do you find yourself using terms such as "expansive," "formal," and "spacious"--a marble foyer or a formal dining room perhaps? Or do the words "cozy," "intimate," and "warm" come to mind--a cheery little breakfast nook or a window seat complete with plenty of pillows and a breathtaking view? More than likely, you--like thousands of other homeowners--are drawn to the more personal spaces in your home, where comfort, beauty, and efficiency meet. In
The Not So Big House, respected architect Sarah Susanka and coauthor Kira Obolensky address our affinity for the "smaller, more personal spaces" and propose "clear, workable guidelines for creating homes that serve both our spiritual needs and our material requirements." The heart of the not-so-big house--which is not "just a small house ... [but] a smaller house," that uses "less space to give greater quality of life," and is designed to not only "accommodate the lifestyles of its occupants" but also to express "our values and our personalities," is discussed in chapter 1, entitled "Bigger Isn't Better." Susanka's urging for homeowners to get creative with their space as well as loads of ideas to encourage that creativity are covered in "Rethinking the House" and "Making Not So Big Work." Discussions of specific needs, such as a home for one and designing for kids, can be found in "Lifestyles of the Not So Rich and Famous," while "Dreams, Details, and Dollars" gets down to the nuts and bolts of the operation, looking at quality versus quantity, budgeting, and what "low end," "middle ground," and "high end" really mean in home design and construction. Lastly, the authors look at the home of the future, which involves simplifying, recycling, reducing waste, and using energy-efficient construction. With more than 200 color photographs, as well as floor plans and Susanka and Obolensky's intelligent and lively dialogue,
The Not So Big House is perfect for homeowners ready to rethink their space.
--Stefanie Hargreaves
Disappointing, considering the premise. 2007-11-07
Although Susanka wrote the entire book on the premise of advocating smaller houses with exquisite features, these houses are huge and boring. The ideas in this book are for new, large, empty spaces. If you can afford to have these houses built, you can afford a real architect to give you design ideas. These aren't revolutionary ideas, they just look like any other house you'd see in a new subdivision, only with bigger windows and a lot more millwork tacked on. I would instead recommend any of the books by Terence Conran or Taunton's other books for kitchen and bath designs. Since Conran is based in Europe, all of his photos are of much smaller and older houses, with design details I have never seen in America. The Taunton's books have details that are more original and can be used in any size house.
A GREAT Antidote to 'McMansion-ism' 2007-11-03
WOW... what a breath of fresh air this book is.
Back in the Reagan years, the go-go '80s, a very ugly trend known as the 'McMansion' or 'Starter Castle' syndrome began in (of course) some red states, and unfortunately spread almost everywhere.
The idea behind 'McMansionism' to have homes designed to IMPRESS visitors, not to be comfortable places to actually LIVE in (remember how many people in the '80s started getting into ostentatious displays of wealth?).
Thus we got the widespread lunacy of couples with maybe one or two kids at home (or none at all) living in 5,000 square foot plus castles with three-story great rooms and not enough money left over to furnish it all.
Hilarious I guess... unless you're the poor schmucks living there. =\
But you were told that was the 'way to go', and tract home builders always have YOUR best interests at heart, right? Oh, heck no.
Even people who should know better can get sucked up in this. My father was a builder for 30 years, and he fell prey to the McMansion syndrome when he built a new house for himself a few years back. 5,500 square feet, no kids at home, just him and my mom, all on one story.
Living in it truly sucked, and he ended up selling it to someone clueless and built himself an actually livable (read 'smaller') two-story across the street.
The 'Not So Big' house series is a great antidote to this madness.
It focuses on a house having only the rooms/spaces you ACTUALLY USE (wotta concept), and designing around human and personal needs, not the idea of 'ostentatious displays of wealth' for the terminally insecure. The result? A home you can actually be happy inhabiting every day, as opposed to only on days you're entertaining, and only because you feel you've 'impressed' your guests.
I do hear a few people whining that good design is too expensive, but the price of bad design, in terms of lack of livability/unhappiness, is a lot higher. Plus, even in simple dollar terms, they're not seeing the big picture.
Susanka maintains that a well-designed house will use a third less square footage than you probably thought you originally needed. With building costs routinely running at around $150/square foot in many parts of the country even for generic-quality builder homes, just by going with a smaller house you've freed up a LOT of cash to put towards better and more personal design/detail, i.e. things that are going to be a lot more rewarding to a home dweller than unnecessary extra formal rooms they use perhaps twice a year.
In the long run, the cost of a large generic house is probably going to work out to be the same as a well-detailed Not So Big home, but the difference is you'll be a lot happier, with a house tailored to the way YOU live.
This book is a winner, and has definitely influenced the conversation about what kind of homes people want to live in. The trend of McMansionism has definitely weakened in the past few years, with more and more people demanding 'right-sized' houses and turning up their noses at the generic starter castles tract home builders try to push them into.
Once the nation comes out of the subprime mess, I think the building landscape of home choices will become even more varied and interesting, and we'll have Ms. Susanka to thank for much of that, as she got the ball rolling.
Will tracts of well-designed 'Not So Big' houses become commonplace, perhaps even the standard in many places? They do fit on smaller lots well, yet fetch more per square foot, and most importantly are what more and more people WANT.
So the same builders who pushed wasteful, unsatisfying tract McMansions on us may end up changing their tune (in the name of $$$, of course)... we shall see.
Great concepts, middling design 2007-09-24
I've found this book to be an invaluable resource and appreciate the philosophy and information contained within it. I agree with the idea that one can make more effective use of the space you have rather than adding an addition or building a bigger house, that with creativity you make better use of a space for multiple purposes, and that we don't have to be stuck with the artificial conventions of a separate dining and living room that never get used except for infrequent guests. Bigger isn't always better, and Susanka shows how you can get lost in some of the new mcmansions being built these days. I also found the numerous photos and illustrations to be helpful to convey Susanka's ideas.
The only problem is that I found the actual design and decor of the homes in the book somehow dated and uninspiring. This is definitely a personal reaction, and I'm sure others would disagree. Despite my issues with the actual look of the homes, I'd recommend this as an essential resource along with John Wheatman's books (whose design does resonate for me).
Inspiration & ideas for rethinking your living space 2007-09-02
The ideas in this book encourage you to think about how you would like use your home space and how to accomplish this marriage of functionality with comfort and aesthetics. Almost every photo has some new little idea to think about. It gives me hope that I'll finally be able to create a comfortable home that integrates everyone's interests & needs. It's inspirational for those of us who have to adapt living spaces to growing families & to those like me who are now empty nesters (but who still need bed space for visiting family members).
