Design Inspiration

Are you planning to build or improve a home, cabin, barn, garage, shed, workshop or backyard structure? Are you looking for practical and beautiful do-it-yourself projects? Then you should be getting our Back Home Newsletter. You’ll enjoy seeing fresh designs and reading about design ideas that will help you create the perfect project.

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The Back Home Newsletter presents free building plans, videos and woodwork projects from a variety of sources. It also covers inexpensive blueprints, do-it-yourself kits and easy-to-use design/build software. Most importantly, it focuses on buildings and projects that are simple and inexpensive to build and to maintain.

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If you’re planning a new barn on an old homestead or in an historic neighborhood, you should take a look at the Historic American Building Survey for design ideas and details. The HABS offers photos and measured drawings of hundreds of historic barns and outbuildings. They are indexed by location, so you can often find buildings that are appropriate for your site’s weather and vernacular building traditions.

1853 Shaker Church Family Cow Barn, State Route 4A, Enfield vicinity, Grafton County, NH

The HABS is a joint effort of the Library of Congress and the National Park Service. It was started by the Works Progress Administration during the Great Depression to offer work to architects and engineers. They were invited to document historic buildings of all types in their areas. The idea was that the records and drawings that they created would be available to future generations, even if the buildings were lost to progress. For the buildings that remained standing, the documents would be a valuable tool for restorers. The extent of the documentation varied greatly from building to building. Some of the old barns are just recorded in photographs. Others have extensive sets of drawings showing floor plans, exterior elevations, timber frames, building details and even details of hand-forged hardware. Most of the material can be viewed online, and higher quality prints can be ordered through the Library of Congress.

The HABS didn’t end with the depression. It’s a work in progress. Preservation minded architects and educators continue to measure and record old structures. You can read more about their efforts to preserve America’s heritage by visiting the website Built in America.

I’ve compiled a list of links to the records of a variety of barns. They span three centuries and show the diversity of American vernacular design. They are just a few samples of the hundreds of barn and outbuilding designs that you can see. Click here to take a look at the list. Then, do your own searches through the vast collection. Make sure to look at the records of historic homes and farmsteads in your area. Many include barns and outbuildings that were on the same properties.

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1720 Job Lane Barn

Deacon Job Lane built his house in Bedford, Massachusetts in the early 1700s. His home, at 295 North Road, has been lovingly restored by the town and a group of dedicated volunteers called the Friends of the Job Lane House, Inc. It’s now a landmark museum open to the public.

When the Friends decided to create a barn similar to the one that originally stood on the site, they asked timber framer Tom Musco to design it. Tom studied 17th century Eastern Massa­chusetts barns, their English precedents and the work of framer Job Lane, the deacon’s grandfa­ther. Tom cut a frame with authentic details: jowled posts, canted tie-beams, tapered rafters and naturally curved oak braces. The frame was raised in a traditional barn raising by the Bedford community.

The body of the barn is 30′ wide, by 20′ deep. A 12′ deep, one-level shed stretches across the back. It’s a classic American “English” style barn, popular throughout New England and the east coasts of the US and Canada until the 19th century. It has a center aisle - an open bay used as a work or storage area that includes a ladder to the loft. Two additional bays, on either side of the center aisle, were for animal pens and grain storage.

Job Lane Barn Timber Frame

Now, not many of us want a building that was originally created to serve the needs of a 1700s family. However, it’s fascinating to know that Tom found many three hundred year old examples to study when he was recreating the Job Lane Barn. Timber frame buildings last forever. It’s also fascinating to know that there are more than a thousand professional timber framers, like Tom, who are building barns, homes and commercial buildings to last for the next three hundred years.

If you’re planning on a new country home, think about a timber frame. Combined with modern SIPs ( Structural Insulated Panels ), which form the outside walls and roof, they can create tight, energy efficient houses that are beautiful inside and out. The Timber Frame Business Council offers a free guide with useful information. You can download Building a Timber Frame Home at: www.TimberFrame.org

If you’re planning on a new barn or country outbuilding, think about a timber frame too. Your great-grandchildren’s great grandchildren will be glad that you did.

Visit Tom Musco’s web site to learn more: www.RoyalstonOak.com

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A Craftsman Home Design

The Craftsman magazine was published by Gustav Stickley between 1901 and 1916. It promoted the American Arts and Crafts style of furniture, homes and home interiors. Over those years, the magazine presented over two hundred home designs and offered blueprints for sale. Craftsman homes featured rectangular rooms, gable and hip roofs with wide overhangs, natural materials and bold shadows cast by recesses, porches, and pergolas. They were refreshingly simple compared to the Victorian homes that preceded them. They were smaller too, and people could afford them.

Stickley popularized using the word “bungalow” for the smallest and least expensive designs. He introduced open-plan layouts and combination dining room/kitchens like we use today. As he put it: “my object has been to develop types of houses and house furnishings that are essential, cheerful, durable and appropriate for the kind of life I believe the intelligent American public desires….we are beginning to realize how important it is to have homes of our own, houses that we like, that we have been instrumental in building, that we will want to have belong to our children. And, of course, this means that the homes must be honest and beautiful dwellings; they must be built to last; they must be so well planned that we want them to last, and yet they must be within our means.”  Stickley used the titles of his home designs to tell the story. I love the fact that one of his houses was titled “A Plain House That Will Last for Generations and Need But Few Repairs.”

There’s not much not to like about ideas like that. It’s amazing to think that they were revolutionary in their day.

The Craftsman inspired home builders, architects and designers in its day. Homes and bungalows in the Craftsman style were built everywhere, particularly in newly developing areas of western states. And, unlike most styles that followed, the Craftsman style never completely lost its popularity. Original Craftsman homes are restored, preserved and cherished, and new ones in the Craftsman style are being created by dozens of architects today.

If you want to learn more, stop at Amazon.com or any bookstore. There are a number of beautiful books on Stickley and his followers. The best is probably Stickley’s Craftsman Home, by Ray Stubblebine. Or, you may want to take a more direct route. All of the original issues of The Craftsman magazine have been scanned and are available as digital reprints, either online, or as very inexpensive PDF downloads. You’ll find links on my growing list of historic plan reprint sources. Take a look. >>>

You’ll find new plans for Craftsman style homes and garages in the Country Homes section of The Country Building Directory on our sidebar.

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