Book design - Girard  

Glassartist-I'm in total...
Glassartist-I'm in total agreement with you. I have the Girard book and its a pain in the ass to look at. Add to that list the original Taschen editions of the Lamprecht, Neutra Complete Works and the Gossel, Case Study Houses book. The multi-volume Modernism Rediscovered (Shulman) and the new Neuhart Eames book are just on the edge of being unwieldy. That said.....there all fun to peruse from time to time...so long as I'm sitting at a table.

jesgord
jesgord you and i have the same books I do. I love them all and read them all but they are heavy, I have them all displayed on thick glass shelfs and just waiting for them to all come tumbling down. with my domus collection.

.... I guess they want ...
.... I guess they want them to be real coffee table books .

I love and have those books. ...
I love and have those books. But I really have to commit to it before popping them open. They suck to use.
I have some older, thinner Neutra books from a library sale that I like better. I get having the giant photography, but I can use my imagination just as well with smaller photography too. It isn't like either is a replacement for a true experience in the buildings ... might as well be a pleasure to use....
The main problem I see with large books is the inability to get lost in them ... kind of a requirement for a 'good' book. If I am too busy wrestling with the beast and focusing on my tired arms/wrists my imagination just can't get there.
The Neuhart Eames book is the closest to the line without crossing over it too far... However, it's still a little much.

.....
see below

I've always though that...
I've always though that "Beautiful Homes and Gardens in California" is the perfect size for an architecture/design book--(oblong, slightly over-sized, but reasonably scaled). Not too big....not too small. One of my all time favorites.

You'd prefer a flip book?
Perhaps you would like each page in stop frame animation so you could flip through them quickly and get a mini-motion-picture in the palm of your hand. You can have your quick reference guides, I've got all those books too and prefer the almost reverence it demands to look at these volumes. Perhaps the "effort" it takes to turn each page helps the reader slow down and enjoy the subjects they celebrate.

more for me
glassartist, et al,
That leaves more for me. I like all the oversized limited or special edition Assouline, Phaidon, and Taschen books I can acquire as well as their regular editions in a wide range of catagories. Visionaire is a favorite.
Large size and storage space is eliminated by collecting SomeSuch press miniature books (or similar companies). The story is Stanley Marcus of Dallas Texas wife complained about a lack of space due to the great amount he had already collected over a lifetime and he began publishing miniature books in 1975. He was said that wanted to continue to collect and he brought them into the house in his suit pocket.
Size does not matter. Quality and more is better. 606 shelving is the solution to the more question.

DudeDah
I suspect the forced reverence and importance is exactly part of the point in the making of these bloated volumes. I prefer a book to actually be important by its content, rather than talk me into it by other means. If it actually is important in content, I will reverently linger over the smallest of volumes. I think I prefer to judge by the content of their character, rather than be swayed by how much the size blusters on about it.

Well said glassartist...
but we are speaking about books whose subjects are primarily experienced VISUALLY. To not take "full" advantage of the SENSE that caters most to the experience of the subject potentially does the subject a disservice. I find it ABSURD that the best way to experience Shulmans photography would be through a dainty little flip book. The bindings of most small books won't allow you to lay them flat so you can't even really see what's in the gutter. I obviously LOVE the scale of these books. They FORCE me to go through them slowly. They might be cumbersome for a novel, but for the subjects they represent, they allow the subjects to be presented with a level of detail I wouldn't be able to see in a smaller format.

NICE
To HAVE you back, DUDEDAH.

In my experience
the large book is no better at displaying a full-page photograph than is the smaller volume. If anything, the opposite is true. I have taken many photos from books with a digital camera, and have also scanned many pages from books of all sizes, in order to share those images with others. It is the slimmer volume that makes these routines pleasurable -- for what that's worth.
For me, it is the content. Giant books seem designed for gift-giving . . .

You know Woody...
I guess a DA addiction is akin to a FB addiction. You try and step away for a while when you feel you've had enough but, for some reason, you end up sticking your head back in to see what, if anything, you've missed.
___
These are art books folks, if you want reference books, buy Encyclopedias or Dictionarys and look up "Girard" or "Case Study House". Heck, why risk the muscle fatigue associated with turning the printed page, GOOGLE IT.
Dang, think of all the canvas Chuck Close could have saved over the years if someone would have told him his technique/skill would have the same, or apparently MORE, impact at 8.5" x 11".

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Have you guys considered knocking something up or buying a stand? I just use a stool with an angled top that doesn't stress the binding, good for flicking through them when sitting on the sofa.
I like a bit of both, sometimes in the really large format books there are things from the archives that aren't usually published (like Le Corb in his undies, erk) but for text and content worth reading without filler I'd take a tatty old contemporary publication any day.