'No one knows sheds like Joel Bird. The creativity and knowledge which won him shed of the year is echoed throughout this brilliant book.' - George Clarke Have you ever wanted to design your very own garden shed? The Book of Shed will show you how: traditional or contemporary, large or small, private rooms to entertaining spaces, guest houses to beach huts - this book is here to teach you how to make your vision a reality, from the very first design brief, to costing your new venture, to sourcing builders and suppliers, to how to structure and maintain your garden shed. Written by designer-builder, TV personality and all-round shed-progressive Joel Bird, The Book of Shed combines imaginative ideas and beautiful design with practical thinking and building knowledge. This wonderful tome is split into four comprehensive sections - on the history and basics of the shed; shed inspiration and style; the shed build; and some of Joel's most distinctive shed case studies - and is the perfect fireside read whether you're a seasoned shed-head or completely new to the joys of your own purpose-built haven, wherever and whatever that may be.

Practical and fully illustrated, this updated reference is indispensable for woodworkers who want to master bending techniques, learn to increase the elasticity of wood, and recognize the woods best-suited for bending. Topics covered include hand bending, machine bending, moisture content, selecting and preparing wood, steaming and other softening treatments, and working with laminates and adhesives. A new color gallery provides craftspeople easy reference to finished projects, and the tips offer advice on how to avoid costly errors, such as weakening or cracking the wood. An essential resource for any wood bender, this how-to guide helps with any rounded construction.

This title presents professional techniques to bring your furniture back to life. It offers complete instructions for dismantling and rebuilding chests, polishing, waxing and staining, how to repair tops and feet, and how to rebuild drawers and doors. It includes a fascinating history describing how chests and cabinets have evolved over time, as well as advice on buying and using tools, equipment and materials. Projects include repairing a split top, replacing a bracket foot, repairing a glazed door, correcting a minor twist, restoring desk drawers, and repairing a grandfather clock. Chests and cabinets often endure a hard life, and over the years the working parts can be damaged through wear and tear. This book provides complete instructions for repairing chests, drawers, doors and desks, all photographed at a leading antique restoration workshop. Projects include replacing drawer runners, cutting a dovetail joint, repairing a sliding tambour, refitting a door, and polishing a 19th-century desk. Detailed information is given on how each piece of furniture is constructed, and how it can be dismantled and reassembled. Illustrated with over 400 beautiful photographs, the book will enable any restorer to learn how to mend antique furniture.

This book explains the nature of dampness in buildings, how to diagnose a dampness problem before it gets out of hand and how to deal with it. It covers the problems of rising dampness and condensation (and how to distinguish them), which are generally
not fully understood, even by many professional surveyors.
The book stresses the need to use a moisture meter to obtain reliable and comprehensive information. Dampness in Buildings will be of immediate practical use to surveyors, architects, builders, housing managers and health inspectors. It will be equally valuable to house owners and potential purchasers.
* Answers common problems in a simple way
* Immediate practical use to professionals
* Immediate practical use to house owners and potential purchasers

Wood Identification & Use is a gift book for wood lovers - an indispensable and informative guide to over a hundred different kinds of wood. This compact directory explores the world's most valuable natural resource in detail. This new gift edition gives helpful details about the most popular and useful woods with illustrations and photographs to help with identification. There is also valuable information on the typical uses, durability, wood defects and potential health hazards for each species. Based on a best-selling reference work, this revised and updated abridged version includes drawings and descriptions of the living trees to enhance appreciation of the raw material of woodwork. In-depth yet accessible this handy pocket guide will be the perfect gift for all woodworkers and wood lovers.

Enjoy outdoor living to the fullest with these functional and decorative furniture projects for deck, patio, yard and garden. From Adirondack chairs, patio bars and picnic tables to showcase Victorian trellises and planters, the experts at American Woodworker provide complete plans and instructions for building great-looking pieces that will beautify your outdoor space. Expert advice on finishing and varnishing ensures that your durable wooden furniture will stand up to the elements for years to come. How to Make Outdoor & Garden Furniture offers 23 do-it-yourself projects for both novice and experienced woodworkers. Superb step-by-step photographs and excellent working drawings help ensure success for both amateur and experienced builders. Each project takes from just a few hours to a weekend to complete, making this book an ideal resource for transforming your outdoor decor.

The Renewable Energy Home Handbook is biased towards the practical, and covers the installation of all leading types of alternative domestic energy sources - from ground- and air-source heat pumps, PV solar electricity generation and solar water heating, to bio-mass domestic heating systems and wind turbines. Discussing the pros and cons of each technology, it also provides you with a clear overview of what's genuinely required and the benefits to be gained from each system. The author, Lindsay Porter, is best known for his books on motor vehicle technology, making car mechanics and body repairs easy to understand and carry out. But alternative energy and conservation have long been a passion for him and his wife, Shan, so this manual is very much a labour of love. Here, Lindsay applies his commitment to making difficult subjects easy for everyone to understand to the money-saving - planet-saving - systems we can apply to our homes.

From hand-forged axes of the Viking conquests to the American homesteader's felling axe, this is a tool that has shaped human history like few others. American Axe pays tribute to this iconic instrument of settlement and industry, with rich history, stunning photography, and profiles of the most collectible vintage axes such as The Woodslasher, Keen Cutter, and True Temper Perfect. Combining his experiences as a forester, axe collector, and former competitive lumberjack, author Brett McLeod conveys the allure of this deceptively simple woodcutting implement and celebrates the resurging interest in its story and use.

Inside this book you ll find ingenious plans for making wildly inspired mechanical marvels from wood. These working wooden wonders might just be the most enjoyable projects you ever build in your shop! Well-illustrated step-by-step projects are arranged by skill level from beginner to advanced, with full-sized patterns attached to the book in a handy pouch. Projects range from a Rapid-Fire Rubber Band Gun and a Kicker Treat Gumball Machine, to whirligigs and classic automatons for cowboys, ballerinas, cats, ships, and more. Create fun games and toys for the whole family, and discover the secrets of kinetic sculpture to build your own interactive wooden gear machine. Learn from woodworking experts like: Clayton Boyer Bob Gilsdorf Dug North Richard Packer David Wakefield ...and many more!"

Fresh, local nutrient-dense fruits vegetables are hard to find in winter in cold climates. Growing warm-weather crops like tomatoes, bananas, avocados, and other perennials is nearly impossible using conventional structures. The solution for millions of backyard and small-scale commercial growers is self-heating solar greenhouses. The Year-round Solar Greenhouse is the one-stop guide to designing and building greenhouses that harness and store energy from the sun to create naturally heated, lush growing environments even in the depths of winter, covering principles of solar greenhouse design and siting, glazing material properties and selection, controlling heat loss, ventilation, and construction methods. Additionally, an in-depth section covers sustainable ways of heating the greenhouse without fossil fuels, including using thermal mass and storing heat underground with a ground to air heat exchanger. Variations include attached solar greenhouses, earth sheltered greenhouses, plus integrating hydroponics and aquaponics. More than a dozen case studies from across North America provide inspiration and demonstrate specific challenges and solutions for growing year-round in any climate. Grow your own food, anytime, anywhere using the power of the sun! Lindsey Schiller is a greenhouse designer and with co-author Marc Plinke, co-owner of Ceres Greenhouse Solutions. Lindsey has designed, toured and helped build hundreds of energy-efficient greenhouses spanning small residential structures to acre-size commercial facilities. Marc Plinke is an inventor-innovator with a PhD in engineering who has focused his engineering mindset on building innovative, energy-efficient and smarter greenhouses, with the intention of enabling people to grow their own food sustainably and year-round.

An informative book designed for beginning and intermediate turners. Bill Bowers leads this step-by-step workshop for constructing the classic cylinder box, cylinder box variants with embellishments, the classic capsule box, and capsule box variants with chatter tool work. With over 300 color photos, each step is clearly described and illustrated, from mounting the blank on the lathe to finishing. Projects include a Raffan box, a pagoda box, the clam shell box, the gourd box, and small hollow form boxes with bottle top and finial top lids. A photo gallery helps give more ideas for new turned box styles.

This title offers expert advice on essential home decoration and maintenance, including painting, papering, tiling, laying floors, carpentry skills, insulation, and outdoor projects and repairs. Projects include painting and varnishing wood, tiling a work surface, laying foam-backed carpet, replacing window panes, fitting window locks, making a garage storage wall, insulating roofs, repairing roofs and guttering, laying decking, making pergolas, building rock gardens, installing water features, and many more. It features a guide to tools for a wide range of do-it-yourself jobs, including using chisels, saws, drills, hammers, screwdrivers, pliers and sanders. Over 2400 photographs illustrate each step-by-step project, to provide instant reference. Looking after your home is economical and satisfying, and this book is filled with practical tips for do-it-yourself jobs. All areas of the home are covered, both indoors and out. There is clear step-by-step advice on internal and external maintenance, repairs, carpentry, flooring, brickwork, roofing, fences, walls and paths.The book includes instructions for painting and papering walls and ceilings, laying ceramic tiles, fitting floor coverings and carpets, making bookshelves, draught-proofing doors, repointing brickwork, laying patios and installing ponds and fountains. The book also contains a guide to tools, from saws and drills to spanners and paintbrushes. A reference for beginners and experienced do-it-yourselfers alike, this is an essential manual that you will refer to again and again.

Supplemented with clear workshop photography, each insightful pointer has been workplace-tested by the editors. Sharpen your woodworking skills for drilling, sawing, routing, clamping, gluing, joinery, finishing and much more.Avoid common pitfalls and solve everyday problems with materials, tools, techniques, shop organization and maintenance. Even the most experienced woodworker doesn't have all the answers, but this big, well-organized book is the place to find them.

Make, mend, and customise your own wardrobe with this highly photographic beginner's guide to machine sewing. A sewing book for beginners that's actually helpful. It's love at first stitch! This highly photographic, easy-to-use guide to machine sewing features more than 200 step-by-step techniques to help you master every stitch in the book! Inside the pages of this sewing reference book, you will find: - More than 200 sewing techniques, all clearly and closely photographed and explained in sharp detail - Discover how to read a pattern, use a sewing machine, and sew basic stitches, seams, and hems - Explore how to put your new-found skills to use to create, personalise, up-cycle, and re-purpose your clothes and soft furnishings. - Photographs and explanations of essential sewing equipment and materials - for both hand and machine sewing - A guide to sewing jargon and terminology that describes when, where, and how to use each tool and technique - Techniques to create something new or to customise things you already have Whether you're a seasoned sewer or just starting to learn how to sew, a fashion design student or sewing for yourself at home, Sew Step by Step will guide you through every hand stitch, machine stitch, and sewing technique you will ever need. With fully updated text and a refreshed design, this is an essential sewing handbook that you will want to keep next to your sewing machine to come back to time and time again. Close-up photographs accompanied by crystal clear instructions take you through everything from cutting out patterns to inserting collars, sleeves and pockets into garments. Explore how to put those skills to use to make, mend and customise your clothes and home furnishings. You will also learn how to find a suitable fabric for every project with an easy-to-use guide to different materials. It also makes a wonderful gift for beginner sewers and expert stitchers alike.

The Sunday Times bestseller, Making It is an inspirational memoir about beating the odds and turning things around even when it all seems hopeless, by Jay Blades, the beloved star of hit BBC One show The Repair Shop. We had our hardships, and there were times that we didn't have a lot of food and didn't have a lot of money. But that didn't stop me having the time of my life. In his book, Jay shares the details of his life, from his childhood growing up sheltered and innocent on a council estate in Hackney, to his adolescence when he was introduced to violent racism at secondary school, to being brutalized by police as a teen, to finally becoming the presenter of the hit primetime show The Repair Shop. Jay reflects on strength, weakness and what it means to be a man. He questions the boundaries society places on male vulnerability and how letting himself be nurtured helped him flourish into the person he is today. An expert at giving a second life to cherished items, Jay's positivity, pragmatism and kindness shine through these pages and show that with care and love, anything can be mended.

This is a colourful gallery of finished work provides further inspiration for green crafting. Wood Pallet Projects shows how anyone can upcycle salvaged pallet wood to create truly one-of-a-kind projects. Maverick craftsman Chris Gleason combines sound woodworking techniques with a hip designer's sensibility to unleash the limitless possibilities of the common skid. Inside you'll find 15 of his inspired projects for rescuing and repurposing pallets. He shows how to construct both indoor and outdoor furniture in a variety of styles, along with other useful items such as a birdhouse, a toolbox and even a ukulele. The author provides important advice on how to make sure that your pallets are safe and not sprayed with harmful chemicals. A colourful gallery of finished work provides further inspiration for green crafting.

Each season is divided into chapters for early, mid, and late, with each chapter opening by identifying signs of the times: mud, flood, blossoms and baby animals mean early spring, for instance, while grass growth and insect populations both peak in early summer. Handy lists and accessible sidebars highlight the season's tasks and priorities, while narrative sections focus on one especially timely topic for each chapter, including plant rotations and soil building in late spring and sustainable woodlot management in mid-autumn. Individual season-by-season charts on what to do when for each topic, such as tractor or equipment maintenance, orchard care, and animal cycles fill out the appendix. Readers have plenty of room to check items off lists or leave notes such as, "Didn't do this in Feb, remember in March!" or "Need new gate latch by summer," making the format of this book a welcomed workhorse.

Recipes for natural cleaning products from green living blogger Wendy Graham.

Learn how to make your home smell as fresh as a daisy with these eco-friendly, money-saving, germ-busting recipes. Using a base of essential oils and natural ingredients, these cleaning products are easy to make, are kinder to your skin and to the environment, while being as effective as any shop-bought solution. The recipes use simple, inexpensive ingredients that are widely available such as bicarbonate of soda, vinegar, salt and citrus fruit, and will leave your home sparkling clean. You can even customise the fragrances to make your home smell crisp, time and time again.

Fresh Clean Home guides the reader from the kitchen to laundry and the bathroom, and also includes a section of recipes for specific household cleaning products, such as window and mirror cleaner, carpet and upholstery spot cleaner and sticky stuff remover. Clean every nook and cranny, with surface cleaners and bathroom shiners, laundry powder and fabric conditioner, kettle descaler and more, for a beautiful, fresh clean home.