Flashing must extend all the way from the wall to the outside. Oh yeah, and it has to be watertight and eight people have to work on it...

Another effort in the never-ending war on bad information and ingrained myths

Old Building Details That Work

Simple country houses, Brutalist bodegas, and superb craftsmanship

Not all places have water that comes out of the ground courtesy of the city. Sometimes it comes out of a truck.

Some familiar and not-so-familiar techniques for building concrete foundations.

A peek at interior and exterior foundation waterproofing in one single house

A split riser allows you to remove the forms without damaging wet concrete.

This old-school method kills two birds with one stone.

Luxury housing development in Ecuador

18 Videos, articles, and animations showing you how to get through Section 1 of the Energy Star Thermal Bypass Checklist. It is about the continuity between various components of the air barrier system and the thermal envelope.

The ongoing saga about designing and constructing a tiny house in Ecuador

Yup—just drill a hole, add a piece of copper wire and drive the screw home

A Mashup of traditional architecture, modern technology, and good old gravity

A snowball effect of physics vs. physical structures: water carries salt to the surface of masonry, which crystallizes and can blow apart its masonry host.

Good amortization doesn't always involve using a building forever—sometimes, it means recapturing the space when the building corrodes

Just because they call it mud doesn’t mean it behaves like dirt and water

Jack Ellis is a brick layer. His work starts at 8 in the morning. Jack is working on the third floor, so he climbs the—what appears to be homemade—ladder up to get on the scaffolding.