I picked up these used French doors at Urban Ore in Berkeley. They have brass door hardware and wavy glass. Installed by Billy Cummings. The exterior is pretty close to being finished. The plan is to have the bed on wheels so I can roll it out onto the deck to sleep out under the stars on dry nights.

I’ve been going through old photos lately. I shot photos of this beautiful barn in 2014. I posted it back then, but I think it’s worth looking at it again, in more detail. Here’s what I wrote:

There are buildings that have — for lack of a better word — a sweetness to them. Like this barn, like a small abandoned cottage in an English field I once found, slowly disintegrating back into the soil from which all its materials came. Inside, I could feel the lives that had been lived there. Or the buildings of master carpenter Lloyd House. It happens most frequently in barns, where practicality and experience create form with function. Architecture without architects.

The unique feature here is that the roof’s curve is achieved by building the rafters out of 1″ material. 1 × 12s laminated together (I believe 4 of them) to achieve the simplest of laminated trusses. The barn is 24′ wide, 32′ long, 26′ to the ridge. (Thanks to Mackenzie Strawn for measuring it; he also wrote: “I have a carpentry manual from the 1930’s with a short section on the Gothic arch barns, they suggest making the roof radius ¾ of the width.”

Exterior

1 by 12’s. It looks like they are laminated, then a curve is cut along the outer edge. Brilliant carpentry!

This is similar to the construction of the Nepenthe restaurant in Big Sur: framed entirely with laminated 1″ lumber

This is my favorite home in the world. Built by Lloyd House and featured in Builders of the Pacific Coast, it’s on a small island in British Columbia. When I first saw it, it took my breath away. It was just perfect. The materials, the size, the shape, the way it fit into the environment as if it had grown there.

Funny thing: After 40+ years photographing builders and their buildings, I meet the builder of my dreams, and his name is Lloyd — House!

Even though we seldom see each other, we’re good friends. He’s built dozens of wonderful buildings in his career — most of them shown in the above book.

BTW, this is my favorite of all seven of our building books. It’s a story, an odyssey, from start to finish, hanging out with these wonderful people in British Columbia and documenting their unique creations. My intent was to take the reader along, riding shotgun, in my excursions to this land of wood and water.

Down an otherwise unremarkable street north of Bay Ridge was this tattered old beauty. Note:

• the cupola (turret? –not sure of the terminology) is perfect in form, if not sheathing. Now there’s some carpentry; I’d love to see how it’s framed inside. There are few carpenters around these days with these skills.
• the awkward addition pasted on to the original gable roof (follow the green shingles). Imagine this building in its original form. Ah, me.

When I see barns, I always look for any sagging in the eaves. Barns that have been neglected and are falling apart often have straight eaves, meaning the foundation was sound.

https://www.pinterest.com/beckyjo/barns-and-buildings/