Orchard House Progress

Good progress is being made on the Orchard House at Swan Barn Farm.

Weatherboarding and studwork for the end room is well underway, and the shingles are starting to go on the roof.

A window and door frame have also appeared in our structure… we still have to make the window and door, but things are definitely moving in the right direction.

Our fantastic volunteer groups have spent so much time over the past year making the hand cleaved shingles for the roof. It is fantastic to see them starting to be nailed on.

Each one is individual and slightly different shaped, it is like a giant jigsaw puzzle. Every shingle has its place, it just isn’t necessarily the first place you try and put it.

Most of the building is an open barn, looking up from underneath you can see the pattern of the shingles above you, I really like the look of them against the roundwood frame and the battens.

It isn’t long now till our countryside crafts open day on 25th July, if you get chance and are in the area it will be a great chance to come to the farm and see the roundwood buildings here as well as lots of other countryside and woody crafts and skills on display.

 

 

Green Woodworking Day

Coming up this weekend on Saturday 30th from 10 – 4 we have a Green Woodworking Event happening here at Swan Barn Farm.

It will be a chance to see the new Speckled Wood building, and ask us questions about it, as well as to see some traditional woodland crafts in action. Amongst other things there will be pole lathing, charcoal burning and shingle making, we will have a display of tractors and machinery and there will be refreshments available. For children a story telling trail will be happening at 11 and 2 and there will also be a bouncy castle.

Parking is not available on site so will be in the town centre car parks. From there it is about a 10 minute walk either down Collards Lane or across the field behind Collingwood Batchelor to Swan Barn Farm. Hope you can join us.

Things have been moving on with the project, last week we had another group of working holiday volunteers helping us out, they had a good week in the woods, making over 800 shingles. As well as that they were drilling holes in the shingles, helping with some sawmilling, preparing and peeling roundwood rafters and making some benches which will sit on the verandah.

They were milled out of some of the Swan Barn Farm oak that came out of the coppice here last winter.

Once the timber had been cut out it was taken into the workshop to be cross cut, planed and have the edges rounded off. Below you can see the timber being processed through our planer thicknesser.

The finished pieces of timber were then put together to a pattern we have been developing here for a while, I think they look really nice, and when the verandah is finished they will make a great place for our long term volunteers to relax after a hard days work in the woods.