The Best of Grand Designs Book

A complete celebration of Britain's favourite architectural show. Kevin McCloud is widely recognised as the pre-eminent commentator on modern architecture and design in Britain a reputation that has grown with the success of his series the Bafta-nominated Grand Designs. The iconic series is broadcast in over 130 countries and regularly gleans 5 million viewers in the UK. Its success says Kevin is due to 'good old-fashioned story telling; of joy and sorrow torment and triumph expressed tangibly in the making of a building'. To celebrate fourteen glorious years of film-making 100 editions of Grand Designs Magazine 100 separate programmes and ten years of hosting the Stirling Prize Kevin now delves into the archives of the series of the Grand Designs Awards and the magazine to highlight his favourite projects. The Best of Grand Designs charts where domestic architecture has come from and is moving to in the first decade or so of a new millennium. And it places people at the centre of the stories of these buildings.Each project is supported by beautiful photography building plans and Kevin's own personal analysis together with commentary from his long-time collaborator Isabel Allen. From the off-grid ecological approach of woodsman Ben Law in Sussex to the quirky experimentalism of Sarah Wigglesworth and Jeremy Till's straw bale house in London Kevin demonstrates how this series continues to contribute to television history and why it provides an important legacy for good house design.Read More