This sweet little timber frame workshop by TimberHomes Vermont is made almost entirely of Eastern White Pine, featuring an unusual compact design completed as a collaboration with the owners. The 200-square-foot hand-raised structure features clerestory windows and a cool split roof that matches the adjacent residence. Accommodating the horizontal windows, which bring a lot of extra daylight into the space, required some creative thinking for the roof system.
“What an interesting frame to cut! Two different roof pitches, rafters that joined the post-tops, and principal purlins doubling as wall plates made the layout particularly tricky. The result is some neat-looking geometry for such a tiny timber frame,” say the builders.
“This timber frame design fits a lot of neat geometry into a compact space. The main rafters are supported by king posts (the short vertical timbers that sit on the cross beams), and carry common purlins (horizontal roof members seated on the rafters), which define the roof plane. The two purlins directly above the long walls are housed into the rafters, and double as wall plates, defining the tops of the walls. The rafters extend several feet beyond the plane of the walls, making for the large overhangs that provide a covered storage area.”
TimberHomes Vermont was unofficially founded at Mountain School, a farm-based semester school in the town of Vershire, Vermont, when students David Hooke and Josh Jackson were asked to build a new car barn. Soon after it was complete, TimberHomes LLC became a reality. The company aims to build “healthy, beautiful, timeless structures that tread lightly on the earth,” and they’re dedicated to using forest products responsibly. That means building with local materials whenever possible.
Eastern white pine is a primary component of every one of the projects pictured above, including a hand-raised post and beam farmhouse, a West Windsor hybrid barn and a bread oven pavilion for the town of Vershire. They also build some pretty awesome gazebos and stairs – you’ll want to see more of their work at their website, TimberHomesLLC.com.
