Great question! We have a very small house so I find myself returning again and again to Cottage Living for inspiration.

I signed up for Fine Homebuilding online - you can do so yearly or a month at a time. I found it very helpful to be able to do searches on specific topics and issues.

I love the Taunton Press/Fine Homebuilding special edition magazines. I also love the House Beautiful regular magazine because it has a "kitchen of the month". I found my inspiration kitchen in an adver-magazine that Sub Zero and Wolf put out for their design-winners (helpful because it names the exact species of countertops, model of faucet, etc.), and have also seen beautiful things in a quarterly called Kitchen Trends. I have had less luck with the Better Homes "Kitchens" type things, b/c I've been gathering info for a few years now (and I'm TKO enough to save all my mags) and I've noticed they seem to re-run some of the same kitchens over and over, so some issues I find there are only 1 or 2 new things.

Renovation Style, Traditional Home - two I always pick up because of the overall, not just kitchen stuff.

When I finally got down to the nitty gritty of decision making I bought three books at Lowes. Two were more about the technical options and pros/cons with them. (Taunton was one of them.) I used the large Signature Kitchens & Baths book (~125 pages) as a Rorschach test since it had a fair amount of varieties - what did I like or dislike style-wise? Repeat and distill. (And still get nervous on the final decisions.)

Funny thing is that I saw my KB designer yesterday and they were commenting on the poor photography in some of these magazines - whose names I won't mention. Although not a factor in figuring out what I like/dislike it was still an eye-opener for me.

NClakehouse, If you like American Bungalow, the Old House Journal and Old House Interiors, you will LOVE Arts and Crafts Homes and the Revival. It's been published for about 2 years now and it's become my favorite. And I've been getting American Bungalow for 6-7 years religiously.

Patser, thanks for the tip. I've seen that new magazine on the news stand but have never purchased it. I'll check it out.

C'mon dbaguy! You're among friends. Tell us which magazines' photography your KD was critical of, and why. Curiousity is killing me.

All of them, LOL! I susbscribe to Old House magazine, because I have an old house, and always learn from articles like, "how to rebuild your windows,'' and to House Beautiful, cuz it's yummy. But I loved just standing at a magazine rack at a store -- try to hit the ones that discount the magazines -- and browsing through the vast array out there. I found I got ideas from everything from Elle Decor to even the ocassional InStyle (the decorating version). If I didn't subsribe to too many, I could pick and choose every month. Did I buy too many? Of course. Did my husband complain? Yes! I was about as addicted to those magazines as I am to Garden Web. But it's all knowledge, all knowledge. Now I don't buy them, but I still leaf through my old ones. It's amazing what you miss in the detail the first 20 times or so you go through those magazines. Is there a support group for addictions like this? Oh, right, it's called GW!

I too am a huge fan of Arts and Crafts and I tried to make my home a combination of that and contemporary. My favorite magazine, "Inspired House" no longer exists. As my house is finished, I'm now concentrating on decoration.

These are not magazines, but I found the following books invaluable: "The New Arts and Crafts houses", Jeremiah Eck's "The Face of Home", most of Sarah Susanka's books, and many, many of the Taunton books.

I too have magazine overload, and wound up throwing out 6-8 years of magazines because there was just too much to sift through. The books have ben easier to navigate, especially when I use post-it notes to flag certain pages.

Although I never would have guessed it, Cottage Living has been a wonderful resource for me. I would never thought of my self as a cottage person, but I do live old Tudor and they do a great job of showing how to keep the integrity of the house while still infusing your own personal style.

My FAVORITE kitchen magazine was a BHG Special Edition Kitchen. I loved each feature and it was all I needed for inspiration and new ideas.

I agree Taunton puts out a lot of really good products. Books, magazines, etc. They are a first-rate company to deal with.

But my favorite magazine is World of Interiors. And I get a lot of ideas from English Home, Period Home and BBC Home and Antiques (I think that's the name). I get them, and others, at Borders.

That style of decorating just fits better with my house and aesthetic -- i.e. fit things in where you can, age wear and quirks are beautiful, bigger isn't better, don't replace wholesale but blend in old with new.

Many of the houses praised in these magazines would not exist in America -- they would have been torn down or gutted into homogeneous, shiny, antimicrobial unrecognizability.

I only find it a little sad that the giant "American style fridge" has been creeping in!

Dream Kitchens has been really useful for me. Kitchens are so subjective and specific to one's taste, lifestyle requirements, oddities of the house structure, and this magazines helps me to understand the background in how the specific kitchen came to be. I have very rarely found a "dream kitchen" in a magazine (and I have dozens and dozens of them, I buy any and every magazine I see!) but I take tidbits of various kitchen design elements and have incorporated it into my own.

Nclakehouse - the Dream Kitchens mag I'm referring to does not mention any specific product names so I don't think it's the same one that you mention that has "thinly disguised advertising." This features between 2-6 page spreads for maybe 30 or so kitchens, with descriptions of how the kitchen came to be.

The best 'magazine' for me has been this GW forum and FKB!! There is no advertising and the information is straight forward. This forum is interactive, so I can ask questions unlike a magazine. Much more useful than a magazine that is paid to push certain items. This pictures in FKB are so helpful, it shows real life kitchens and the creativity is amazing!! Good luck!

New Old House Magazine, and all books by Sarah Susanka and Russell Versaci --great old house styles for smaller spaces, but with modern amenities/sensibilities.

Redroze, sorry if it appeared that I slighted your favorite publication. I was referring to a generic type of "Dream Kichen" magazine and didn't even know there was one with that actual title! (My husband will be astounded to know that there's a kitchen magazine out there that *haven't* bought). I can't even remember the actual names of the ones I'm referring to, but you all know the type, which is short on substance and pushes whatever the advertiser is paying them to promote...Anyway, now I'm going to have to look for the actual one by that title, based on your recommendation. Thanks!
Where would we all be without Taunton publications? They are the best IMHO.

Not to worry nclakehouse! I happen to have it in my purse now (sneaking looks here and there during work of course). The publisher is Meredith Specials, and your average Chapters or Indigo would probably have it.