The Sustainable Sites Handbook: A Complete Guide to the Principles, Strategies, and Best Practices for Sustainable Landscapes 1st Edition

Landscape design should be functional and aesthetically pleasing. This is a book that Aldo Leopold, Rachael Carson & Ian McHarg would be proud of. Finally, the natural environment is getting the attention it deserves and needs. Human health, well being and sustainability are compatible, & necessary. In 2005, the Sustainable Sites Initiative (SSI) was created, a logical extension of LEED building standards. This handbook explains how social and economical issues are properly integrated with water, soil and air concerns. Innovation, research, monitoring and, yes, even common sense are the driving forces of how to make our outside environments positively sustainable. It is an educational textbook and summation of what has improved in 9 years. It can be useful to anyone from homeowner to architect. It is not a weekend makeover book. It teaches those who want, and need, to learn. Hopefully this book will change your mindset, improve your life and save the planet that we are not so slowly destroying. Great book!

I purchased this book as one of the recommended readings for the LARE exams; although it contains useful & pertinent information, I am astonished with the poor quality of the paper and the grainy black & white images... this is intended as a reference manual for designers, right? Across both my education and professional experience, I have never seen any type of presentation with black and white graphics. More surprising still, is the fact that you can purchase Dirr's Encyclopedia which has full color quality pictures across several hundred pages of quality paper for less than half the price of this book. I do recommend this book for those who are taking the LARE exams but am disappointed with the poor quality of the graphics.

The book is really thorough and will hopefully prove helpful for the LARE. I think the graphics are fine. My only real criticism since I've been reading this book non-stop lately is that I have noticed a good amount of typos, which is irritating when you're trying to learn new material. It's also overly repetitive at times.

Used by others in office; no personal experience.

SSH is required reading to students and practitioners of landscape architecture. Thank you Ms. Calkins

recommend to all who need this, really helpful, comprehensively tell all problem and solutionand lot of example provided to help well design relate to aesthetic portion

good book