Journal

Embodied carbon, the order a retrofit should follow, why replacement windows rarely pay, and what has to change before reuse becomes the default choice.

An hour on Beacon Hill, read slowly: brick bonds, purple window glass, Federal and Greek Revival doorways, granite lintels, cast iron and the bowfronts.

Cement mortar is stronger than lime, which is exactly why it damages historic brick and stone. How mortar really works, and how to repoint without harm.

A practical guide to surveying an old building by hand: the kit, running dimensions, triangulating a room that is not square, and working from one datum.

Adaptive reuse keeps a building and changes the job it does. What the term really covers, why older cities keep producing candidates, and how it fails.