HOW-TO BOOKS

There’s nothing like a good book!

Endeavour is all about open-source information about building green, and you’ll find a lot of great, free resources here on our website. 

But for in-depth, technical information on sustainable architecture it’s hard to beat a good book. Endeavour is the series editor for New Society Publishers’ Sustainable Building Essentials books. The series covers a full range of natural and green building techniques. Firmly rooted in building science and drawing on decades of experience, these large-format, highly illustrated manuals deliver comprehensive, practical guidance from leading experts using a well-organized step-by-step approach.

Written by world leading experts, these succinct, user-friendly handbooks are indispensable tools for any project where accurate and reliable information is key to success.

Essential Sustainable Home Design

A Complete Guide to Goals, Options, and the Design Process

by Chris Magwood

Many people dream of building a beautiful, environmentally friendly home. But until now there has been no systematic guide to help potential builders work through the complete process of imagining, planning, designing, and building their ideal, sustainable home.

Essential Sustainable Home Design walks potential homebuilders through the process starting with key concepts, principles, and a project vision that will guide the house to completion.

Coverage includes:

• How to clarify your ideas and create a practical pathway to achieving your dream
• A criteria matrix to guide design, material, and systems decisions
• Creating a strong, integrated design team and working with professionals and code officials to keep the project on track from start to finish
• Key building science concepts that make for a high-performance, durable building
• Primer on building logistics, material sourcing, and protocols to ensure that the initial vision for the project comes to fruition
• One-page summaries and ratings of popular sustainable building materials and system options.

Ideal for owner-builders and sustainable building contractors working with clients aiming to design and build a sustainable home.

Essential Hempcrete Construction

The Complete Step-by-Step Guide

by Chris Magwood

Hempcrete is a versatile, energy-efficient natural insulation material, useful for walls, roofs and floors. Made from the inner stem of the hemp plant mixed with a lime-based binder, it is a very strong, lightweight and breathable alternative to manufactured insulations. Essential Hempcrete Construction is a fully illustrated practical guide to this affordable, renewable method, from procurement to finishing.

Going well beyond the scope of many natural building books, this indispensable manual includes a complete introduction to hempcrete, packed with all the information you need to determine whether it’s the right choice for your project. It covers:

• Material specifications, testing and building code references and climate data

• Detail drawings for design reference

• Tool lists, and complete step-by-step instructions for mixing and placing hempcrete

• Finishing and maintenance techniques

• Budgeting and labor estimates

• Additional resources.

Essential Light Straw Clay Construction

The Complete Step-by-Step Guide

by Lydia Doleman

Light straw clay — straw mixed with clay slip — is a versatile, easy-to-use wall building material. Also called “slip-straw,” its durability has been proven in beautiful, centuries-old buildings across Northern Europe and in modern high-performance buildings in North America.

Building code compliant in the US and using “waste” materials with high insulation value and excellent moisture handling qualities, it’s both high-performance and low-impact. 

Distilling decades of experience, Essential Light Straw Clay Construction is the most complete book in English on the broad range of light straw clay techniques in use today. Fully illustrated, it provides step-by-step guidance for both the DIYer and professional designer and builder alike. It covers:

• Material specifications, performance, and when and where to use it
• Estimating quantities, costs, and sourcing
• Illustrated, step-by-step guidance for mixing and installation, including “slip-chip” variations
• Detail drawings for various wall systems including stud, timber, and pole framing, Larsen trusses, I-joists, plus retrofits
• Code references, compliance, and best practice
• Finishing and maintenance techniques
• Additional resources.

Essential Natural Plasters

A Guide to Materials, Recipes, and Use

by Michael Henry & Tina Therrien

Natural plasters made of clay, lime, and other materials mixed with sand are beautiful building finishes. Fun to work with, low-impact, and allowing infinite creativity, they are high performance and provide proven, centuries-long durability.

Yet until now there’s been no resource that has pulled together the best North American plaster recipes and how-to into one place. Essential Natural Plasters covers it all:

• Sourcing and selecting materials, including site-soils
• Clay, lime, and gypsum plasters as well as fibers and amendments
• Interior and exterior use and specialty plasters such as tadelakt for bathrooms
• Preparing substrates, from straw bales and cob to lath and sheetrock
• How to set-up a safe, efficient worksite
• Mixing, testing, tinting, and applying plasters and plaster repair
• Coveted recipes from leading plasterers in Ontario, Vermont, New Mexico, France, and New Zealand.

 Richly illustrated and deeply researched,

Essential Rammed Earth Construction

The Complete Step-by-Step Guide

by Tim Krahn

Everything you need to know to build with rammed earth in warm and cold climates.

Rammed earth – sand, gravel, and clay or lime/cement binder packed into forms – is a low-energy, high-performance building method, yielding beautiful, sustainable results. It’s thermally stable and can be insulated, can actively modulate humidity, provides a healthy indoor environment, and allows site materials to be used for major structural and building envelope elements.

Essential Rammed Earth Construction covers design, building science, tools, and step-by-step building methods for any climate, with a special emphasis on building in cold climates of the northern US, Canada, and northern Europe. Coverage includes:

• Overview of earthen building
• Appropriate use of rammed earth walls
• Stabilized versus raw rammed earth
• Design considerations, including structural, insulation, and building envelope details
• Special considerations for cold and freeze-thaw climates
• Construction drawings, with step-by-step building instructions
• Tools and labor covering industrial methods, low-tech techniques, formwork options, mix design, budgets, and schedules
• Codes, inspections, and permits.

This guide is an essential resource for experienced builders, DIY home owners, designers, engineers, and architects interested in learning about rammed earth construction.

Essential Rainwater Harvesting

A Guide to Home-Scale System Design

by Rob Avis & Michelle Avis

Design a rainwater harvesting system for any home in any climate.

Water is a crucial resource increasingly under stress. Yet rainfall, even in arid climates, can make up a sizable portion of any home, acreage, or farm’s water requirements if harvested and utilized with care. The key is high-quality site-specific design and sensible maintenance. 

Essential Rainwater Harvesting is a comprehensive manual for designing, building, and maintaining water harvesting systems for the warm and cold climates of the world. Presenting design considerations and approaches for the most common household rainwater supply scenarios – primary, supplemental, and off-grid supply – this step-by-step approach covers:

• Planning for full-property water security
• Guidance on navigating regulatory requirements
• Templates for building your own spreadsheet-based calculation tool
• Site-specific planning and spatial layout
• Materials and component design and selection
• System maintenance and upkeep.

Incorporating the latest independent research, this practical resource provides DIYers, trades, and rainwater practitioners with the essential tools, methods, and technical know-how to design, confidently build, and maintain rainwater harvesting systems that produce quality water without necessarily needing end-of-line disinfection or sterilization.