I have taken thousands of photographs over the many years that I have built handmade homes.

This photo may be my favorite.

The image reveals an incredible vintage timber-frame that we were re-erecting, complete with a solid stone foundation, and located on a scenic Virginia hillside.

The weather was perfect that day.

The birds were singing.

It was a really good day… life just doesn’t give anyone enough of those kind of days.

But what makes the photo pop for me, is the image of my lead man pointing instructions to the crew on what needed attention at that moment.

I felt like I captured a “Sistine Chapel moment”… where the creator was reaching out to create with the tip of his finger.

I could easily visualize this same scene having been played out, with this same frame, 200 years before.

Originally posted 2015-04-08 20:05:42.

Here is the Sugar Hollow house.

At this point in her construction the house is primed and ready for her final coat of paint.

I designed and built this home years ago on a wooded hillside in western Albemarle County.

My client wanted a Virgina farmhouse look. He liked the idea of an exposed post and beam interior for the main part of the house, and a we went with standard construction for the kitchen addition off of that.

I combined an old timber frame, with stone gathered from a couple of old foundations out of the Valley, and trim, removed from yet another home.

Here we have one of my favorite timber frames, put together by one of my favorite crews… all of them friends for life… men of great integrity and skill.

And the homeowner we built for… just a great guy… low key, and so appreciative, throughout the entire project.

Follow along in the coming days as I detail the construction of this wonderful home.

Originally posted 2015-04-08 19:24:51.

I salvaged an old house down near the North Carolina border many years ago. The home was built in the late 1700’s and she had brick nogging in the walls between the timbers.

Nogging was often installed in this part of the country where clay was bountiful to make bricks in the sun. The bricks were of course all soft and would crumble easily, yes, because of their age, but mainly because they had not been kiln fired.

The nogging served as a crude form of insulation, but mainly as a weather sealer and heat mass. Certainly it beat having nothing at all in the walls. I can say that the look is stunning… jaw dropping… to this old boy.

But the centuries of contact between earth and wood had rotted every piece within this home.

One of my crewmembers stepped forward and adopted this house as an outbuilding on his property.

Originally posted 2015-04-01 15:15:15.

We raised our food in the garden that we created.

We got our water out of a spring located on our property.

We kept our food cold in a make-shift refrigerator that I put together in the stream.

We slept in a “tent” that I built out of old lumber and plastic for eight months, as we built a small home using materials that we had salvaged from an old house, an old barn, and an old school.

We lived a simple life with no clocks, or calendars. But we had plenty of candles and books.

And then, children happened.

We moved back to Virginia and I began building for others. The rest is history.

I have shared all this with you to reveal a bit about myself, but also to remind us all that where we live, and how we live, is a choice. There is always another option. Anyone can have a handmade house, even those lean-in-the-wallet… but, it might require sacrifice and discomfort.

Originally posted 2015-03-30 13:49:16.

Shortly after getting married my wife and I took every dollar that we had and bought 15 acres of Tennessee wooded mountain land.

I felt at $350 per acre that it was a bargain.

We moved onto our land with an old Datsun pickup truck and all of our belongings packed safely in the back. We were excited for the adventure that lied ahead.

Originally posted 2015-03-30 13:25:28.

There was a time in my life that I would have loved to have had this little shed…

…to live in.

Seriously.

Originally posted 2015-03-30 12:34:16.

Here are two of the outbuildings that I built at the Madison House. The one in the distance is the chicken coop. The other is the garden house.

Outbuildings add SO much to the beauty of a property. So, when it comes time to build an outdoor structure try to use old materials and design these buildings with care. Old windows and siding are some of the cheapest salvaged materials that you will find… seek them out.

I encourage you to drive on by those places that sell manufactured sheds, have some fun, get some exercise, and build something that you will enjoy looking at during the years ahead!

Originally posted 2015-03-29 21:23:42.

I am proud of the fact that so far I have been able to save over a hundred old structures from being lost. Some of these were restored, some were moved and rebuilt, and some were salvaged for the usable materials that still remained after fire, rot, and theft struck.

But for every one that I saved there were ten that I could do nothing but walk away. I am certain that by now most of these historic structures only remain in memory. There simply isn’t enough people that want to build a salvaged home.

If I may, let me share three of these lost treasures with you today.

Originally posted 2015-03-22 11:09:27.

I’ve attached three photos… the first two are of the house the day we met. The other was taken during her “finer days”.

The house didn’t look all that bad as I approached from a distance but once I entered and began to explore, the more I realized that almost every piece of this incredible home, from the basement… to the rafters, was rotten or termite ridden.

She was still standing, but a complete loss.

🙁

Originally posted 2015-03-13 16:04:08.

That’s pronounced “Mickey Tavern” for all those out-of-towners out there. 😉

Michie Tavern is a great place to visit, open to the public just about everyday and located about a half mile before you reach the entrance of Monticello, the home of Thomas Jefferson.

The Tavern offers tours of this historic structure, and from their kitchen they serve up some of the best fried chicken that you have ever tasted. It’s well worth the visit.

The folks there have always been very kind to me and they will occasionally call up me for assistance with the upkeep of some of their historic structures. Sometimes they will offer me a piece of chicken or a slice of pie as extra incentive. It works… trust me. lol

The most interesting restoration work that I ever did there was replacing the treads on the Taverns staircase. The original treads had reached the point of structural failure, where they either needed to be replaced, or the public would be denied access to the second floor.

It was a very challenging undertaking.

Every tread was a different length and width, none were what I would refer to as a rectangle, and each was somehow wedged in place. The staircase was not designed for repair… it was designed to last forever… and if for some reason, centuries later, it did need repair… well… unlucky is the chap that gets that job!

And that, would be me.

I like a challenge, I like fussy things. But there was an added twist, this was a museum that was open to the public and they didn’t want to close it for repair. So, they asked if I could come in at night, after closing, and replace the stair treads.

OK… fine.

I came in that first night carrying my tools, as the staff, dressed in their 18th century clothing, came filing out. One of the owners of the Tavern was there to ensure that all was well and to show me how to lock up when I was done.

It was then that she felt compelled to tell me that she had on multiple occasions heard and seen ghosts within the house. She went into great detail about each encounter, and then I found that other staff members would join in and share their experiences. All assured me that these “guests” were friendly. Swell.

It took me almost two weeks of working a few hours each night to replace all the treads. I needed to be so careful not to damage anything as I struggled to remove the old treads that refused to give up the ghost, and then to create exact replacements, and then install them.

I never saw a ghost or a spirit there while I was working. I sure heard many pops and groans from the old tavern, each giving me a surge of adrenaline. My mind kept me plenty alert to my unusual environment… for sure. Sometimes I would turn my radio on just so I could focus on my work. After all, everyone knows that classic rock will protect you from ghosts.

I must say it was a rare treasured moment working there. Not many people have the opportunity to spend time alone in a historic museum. Not only is the house old, and decorated to be old, and furnished with antiques to recreate colonial America… as it was… down to the smallest detail… even the lighting felt like it was from another time.

If you ever get a chance to take a candlelight tour of a historic home, seize the opportunity. You will witness a different world. I did just that, for two weeks at Michie Tavern.

Originally posted 2015-03-13 15:00:03.