Subscribe to RSS feed
Do we need a tagline?
4 commentsSo the other day, one of the editors suggested that maybe Fine Homebuilding needed a tagline. You know, a little phrase on the magazine’s cover that clarifies what it’s about and who it’s for.
view details
A happy accident
Like so many topics in these politically divisive times, patriotism is a tricky thing. Personally, I don’t think it’s determined by whether you wear a flag pin on your lapel or whether you agree with all our government’s policies.
view details
Tolerances
A skilled tradesman knows a thousand such things and has forgotten he knows them. They are so naturally a part of what he does that he takes them for granted.
view details
The quality of our decisions
If you know anything about building stone walls, you know that stones with flat faces are much prized. Flat faces turned outward help to make a good-looking wall.
view details
The wedding gift
When my friend Chris Green got married last summer, I gave him, as a wedding gift, one day of my labor. He is remodeling his small house to accommodate a now-expanded family, and I knew he could use some help.
view details
My Oregon swimming pool
One of the things that editing a magazine has in common with renovating an old house is that the ability to get something done depends absolutely on your ability to ignore all the other things that also need to be done.
view details
On message for our brand
I went to a brand sensibility meeting this week. It was hard for me. Generally, I’m the kind of guy who makes fun of such things, not attends them.
view details
Happy landings, and the stairs are finished
Well, I finally finished my staircase, and I’m as pleased as the perfectionist, son-of-a-surgeon, editor of Fine Homebuilding is likely ever to be with his own work.
view details
Dealing with mistakes
The latest thing I’ve learned about making mistakes, like firing a nail through your brand-new handrail, is that they make good fodder for a blog.
view details
History and pitfalls of baluster spacing
The rest of the job went OK until I nailed in the last baluster. Because the newel post was in the way, I held the nail gun at a different angle. Whoops.
view details
About this blog
As the editor of Fine Homebuilding, I spend my weekdays trying to produce a magazine that will satisfy 300,000 of the most demanding builders, both professional and amateur. As the owner of a 200-year old Cape in Connecticut’s Litchfield Hills, I spend weekends working on my house.
Each activity invariably informs, and complicates, the other. In this blog, I’ll offer observations from both worlds -- publishing and building -- with the hope of providing some useful or at least entertaining insights.
