Online idea exchanges like Pinterest and Houzz are great resources for inspiration. There's so much information on these sites that is easily gathered, collected, and used by clients to create wish lists of images that need to be included in their "dream home". However, as an architect, I feel it is my duty to point out to my clients and all of you: Use with caution! The disparate images served by search terms may represent homes from all over the country -- or even all ove

Back in 1876 Abraham Weston referred to New Jersey as "The Garden State" during the Centennial Exhibition, and the name stuck. If we were to give N.J. a new nickname in 2014, I would nominate "The Low-Maintenance State" as a fairly accurate description, at least as far as our approach to construction. Over the past twenty years the construction industry's methods of building have evolved to incorporate the emerging line of low-maintenance materials that are the result of the

Some people believe they can compare builders by asking how much they cost "per foot." They believe that building houses is like commodities trading: the items are all the same, so find the least expensive, right? To do this, many buyers compare the "square foot costs" of each builder, often searched through the Internet, whether building in the buyer's housing market or not. Here is what I tell all of my clients: Square foot costs are wrong indicators of the value of a buil