Gates, doors, and entryways play a large role in the way that humans organize meaning.  Consider that prayers, linguistic expressions, and literary expressions heavily lean on the symbolism of doorways.

The Power of Entrances (Architecture’s Way to Make a First Impression)

A beautiful entrance can literally frame the stance of a home, garden, or barn towards the outside world. I have been thinking a lot about doors lately and want to take this opportunity to share images of some of my favorite entrances…from the very large to the very small, from those above my doorstep to those much farther afoot.

The Gateways of Japan

Last year, I had the incredible opportunity to travel around Japan, viewing some of the largest and the oldest timber frame structures in the world. The craftsmanship was astounding and inspiring!

In the next photos, you can see a couple of entrance gates and I will start this reflection with these large doorways. The first massive entrance is a Torii gate, which signifies that you are entering a sacred space. The second is the entrance to a temple. Leaving the profane behind, and entering the sacred, is a theme signified in many religions.

While in Japan, I also got to view many garden gates- and these really spoke to me!

That gateway represents a remarkable invitation to enter nature!

Green Mountain Gateways and Gazebos

Speaking of spaces for reflection, the next photo is of a timber frame gazebo that Green Mountain Timber Frames founder Dan McKeen built a few years ago.

Not unlike the garden pictured above, the goal for the pavilion was to create a space of invitation- invitation to reflect and take in the view of the Vermont Green Mountains. Careful thought went into the layout and proportions of the entrances to this space.

The significance of doorways is often noted when we take that first photo of our new home, or of our children standing in front of the doorway as they leave for a first day of school.

We also put prayer scrolls, flags, and wise sayings on or over our doorways. The significance of stepping over a threshold is noted in so many literary and experiential texts.

Home Sweet Home

The next photo shows my partner and I standing in front of an 1820s corn crib that we have dismantled and will be re-erecting as our own cabin retreat in the woods.

A Timber Frame Porch for a Home in the Mountains

The Green Mountain Timber Frames crew recently built a timber frame porch as an addition to a barn home. The porch is 44-feet long, and I love the way the dormer frames the entrance to this lovely space. The steps leading through garden and grass to an off-center door present a beautiful entrance.

Here are a couple more shots of the timber frame porch:

We have come across beautiful barn doors as we do restoration work, and the granary that we are currently restoring at our shop is no exception. Note the beautiful hand forged hinges in the following photos.

We will be putting this building back up with a bell tower and have been carefully thinking about the best way to craft the new entrance, with the original hinges, into the space that will be a small chapel.

Here is our latest sketch of the entry and windows:

Here is a photo of a grist mill that I recently drove past. I love the doorway on this building!

I have had opportunities to construct a few doors that serve as the entrance to restored barn homes. I have always found it incredibly meaningful to handcraft the “gateway” into a home centered around a barn that we have restored. This next door was built out of maple, and a local artist crafted the bullseye glass.

In this photo and the next, you can see “hidden” doors that lead to outdoor closets on the right-hand side of the doorway.

Materials Matter

Significance can also be found in the materials used for an entrance. When I built a timber frame sugar house on my family’s farm, we had to cut down a plum tree that had lived on the barn site. Out of respect for the tree, I used a branch of the plum to frame the top of the door opening.

Last week, we delivered two doors that will be installed as the entrance to a large timber frame that we recently constructed. Each door is 48-inches wide, so when both swung open on their strap hinges, the opening will be 8 feet. Significantly, the cherry boards that create the interior panels of the two doors are from a tree that was removed from the spot where the barn now lives.

First, the barn:

And here is one of the custom barn doors ready for delivery:

Now, since who doesn’t like a little potty talk, I better throw in a photo of one my favorite outhouse doors!

Good Things Come in All Sizes

Here at Green Mountain Timber Frames, we have also been fortunate to think about very small entrances. Some kinds of birds have long been considered healthy and happy to have around and in New England barns. For example, swallow doors were sometimes put in the peak of barns to encourage nesting inside. The benefit to the farmers and animals, aside from getting to watch the beautiful acrobats fly all about, was that the feathered friends helped to keep the population of flies in check.

Here is a photo of one of my favorite vintage barns.

Note the mini doors up in the siding:

We replicated this concept in a restored barn that we erected. Along with our client, we designed the opening and nesting box inside for a kestrel, which is a beautiful little raptor that has been struggling in Vermont. It took a few years, but a pair did eventually move in! You can read more about this restored barn.

Here is the barn:

And here is one of its residents!

We also just finished taking down a wonderful little 14 x 22 barn. This structure was first used as a corn crib and later converted to a trappers cabin. Up at the gable peak is a cute little bird door, complete with a landing pad!

Desert Doorways

To end this meandering blog on entrances, I want to show you two beautiful natural doorways that I just encountered while backpacking in the Superstition Mountains in Arizona.

Judging by the beauty of this woven grass, I think it is possible that animals also value the aesthetic of a gorgeous entrance. Here is a bird’s nest, well-protected in the branches of a Jumping Cholla cactus:

And for someone with a bit of arachnophobia, I had to do some steady breathing to really take in the beauty of this spider hole! From my reading since the trip, it seems that some spiders will weave grass around their entrance to channel rain away. But given the beauty of this construction, I am personally tempted to think that they may care about the aesthetic as well.

What do you think?

Do you love little barn doors, antiques and all things quaint?

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What is in a label?

When it comes to timber framing – a great deal!

The homes and historic barns that we disassemble have many individual pieces. A timber frame can easily have over two hundred different pieces of hand crafted wood and each piece has been carefully fit and adjusted to create a specific joint. Individual timbers and braces were scribed to each other. Braces in a building may look interchangeable, but they are not!

We use the terms “bent” and “plate wall” to describe the two types of cross sections in a barn. There are two plate walls in every timber frame, which are the exterior walls where the roof comes down.

“Bents” are a cross section going in the other direction, creating the gable ends and supporting systems for the interior of the building.  A frame can have anywhere from two bents to six or even more, depending on the barn size. Here is a scaled drawing of one bent cross section of an 1840s timber frame. This barn has four bents. Multiply this cross section by four and you can imagine the four bents, usually similar but not identical. There are also the two eve walls with multiple braces, which can’t get mixed in with the “bent” braces! So how does one know where to put each piece of wood?
The labeling system!

History of Labeling Timber Frames
In many of the older barns and homes, even the roof boards and floorboards were labeled! Long before a crew of framers, farmers and family showed up for a house raising, someone had carefully organized the materials and designated a spot for each piece. 

Why would it make sense to label even the roof boards?
One reason is that the boards were often still in the tapered shape of a tree trunk. In other words, they are wider at one end – the base of the tree – and narrower at the other. By switching the direction of the taper – board to board – as you moved up the roof, the framers could get the most width possible out of each board without getting too uneven before reaching the peak of the building. 

Roman numerals were the most common method for inscribing labels on the beams and boards:

We recently completed the restoration of a 1790s gambrel home. (You can read about it in this blog.) This frame is a wonderful example of the way that craftsmen of the past insured that the timbers all ended up in the right place.

In the gambrel house we restored, there are four bents for a total of 12 posts on the first floor. There are 8 more on the second floor.

But how do you designate which side of the building each piece will live on?
Each exterior post is a component of both an eve wall, and a member of a bent. Therefore, each of the joint sections must be labeled. When we cut a new frame or relabel an old frame, we use “B” for bent, and “P” for plate, or eve wall. On top of this distinction, we distinguish which of the two eave walls any given post or brace belongs to.

In the gambrel, the original builders added a diagonal line to the numbers in order to make this distinction. This line makes post #4 look like this:Note the four slashes, and the one slash with an additional diagonal cut. The opposite wall does not have the diagonal marking. 

Below is a label on a floor joist that had us stumped for a while. Then we realized – the framers were distinguishing the roman numeral 9- IX, from the roman numeral 11- XI. What if on raising day someone was looking at the floor joist upside down?

Joist #9 drops into the “summer beam”, the central heavy timber that supports the floor system.

Here is #11, not to be confused with #9!

We have not seen this marking before, but surmise that it meant 11. If anyone has seen this designation for 11 before, please tell us about it!

How do you designate that a post is a center post rather than located on an exterior wall?
Here is how they labeled an exterior mid post on the gambrel:

Someone took artistic care with this inscription!

And here is the label on an upper post that supports the rafter system. Notice our modern (and much less attractive) label on the tenon where it will be hidden:The gambrel has a unique system where the floor girts and joists went out beyond the eve to create an overhang. Heavy planks rested on the joist tails. Here is a photo of the labeling of those planks:Another beautiful inscription was often placed on a central board in the ceiling. This photo is one of these daisy wheels:We re-label each joint as we take it down. Occasionally, in the excitement of disassembly, we miss a piece or even mis-label. When we are stumped, we often look for the original labels and figure out where it will be “at home.”

Pragmatic & Beautiful
These old labels are both useful and artistic. They were created using very sharp chisels, often of a “gouge” or cupped variety, as well as compasses. The labels add beauty to the finished space when visible. As with all aspects of vintage frames, much can be learned about the people who crafted the barns or homes by looking at their “handwriting.”

Some label inscriptions are flowery and large; others are more subtle and small, meant to disappear visually once the frame is up.

Below is a brace and post from the North Hero barn:

This builder used much smaller labels and a different marking

How did the framers come up with these markings, and are they universal? 

We do not know how the craftsmen from the past decided on the specifics of their labeling systems. The pragmatic aspect of the labels means that each frame contains its own logic. That is to say, it is a self-contained system that can differ frame to frame. We are just grateful when we see the labels match each other on each joint and we know we’ve put the pieces back together correctly! We like to imagine the framers carefully making the inscriptions generations ago, and we are grateful for the artistic care represented in these labels!

Here is one of my favorites – a label designating a second floor post and brace on the gambrel:

Have you seen labels on pieces of your house? 

Please let us know what you might know about old labeling systems! In particular, we are curious if anyone has seen the representation of 11 that we’ve shown on the gambrel floor joist. We’d love to hear from you.

Green Mountain Timber Frames specializes in restoring historic timber frames and old barn homes. Interested in more information?
We’d love to hear from you!
(802) 774.8972
Luke@GreenMountainTimberFrames.com