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Thu, Apr 3 2008 “Dear Sirs,
Despite being longtime subscribers, we are canceling our subscription to Fine Homebuilding. We are very disappointed in the direction your magazine is headed. As architects, we are constantly battling against the type of construction and materials you seem to be intent on promoting—vinyl siding, vinyl windows, fake decking, fake stone, etc. Perhaps a name change to ‘Common House Assembly’?
Sincerely…”
 I hate vinyl siding. I hate it almost as much as I hate letters like the one above, which I received last week from a reader in Virginia. During my first 10 years as editor of Fine Homebuilding, I refused to publish an article about how to install vinyl siding. And when I finally did publish one, I commissioned Alex Wilson to write a companion piece called “Does Vinyl Belong on a Fine Home?” in which he explored the environmental issues surrounding the use of polyvinyl chloride. Alex’s conclusion—and this was six years ago, mind you—was that people should avoid vinyl building products wherever possible.
So why publish the article about vinyl siding in the first place? Well, despite what I think or what Alex thinks, some readers of Fine Homebuilding like vinyl siding, and other readers, even if they don’t like it, are asked to install the stuff on their customers’ homes. I figured they should have access to good information about how to install vinyl siding correctly. I published the article as a service to the readers who pay a dear price for this magazine.
The question is: Were we promoting vinyl siding by publishing an article about how to install it? Maybe. But we were also promoting its antithesis because the same issue featured an article about timber-framing. Similarly, when we ran a story on vinyl windows, we also featured custom concrete counters. When we covered synthetic decking, we covered built-up interior-trim details with wood moldings. And when we recently published an article about working with manufactured stone, the same issue contained an article about restoring old windows.
I don’t believe that Fine Homebuilding’s coverage of vinyl, composite, and imitation products represents a new direction for the magazine, as our disappointed reader suggests. I think it reflects the direction of the home-building industry in general, and we, as journalists, are charged with covering that industry. I also think that a comprehensive look at the projects and techniques featured in Fine Homebuilding over the years, especially relative to other building magazines, would actually reveal a bias toward natural, durable, authentic materials.
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