The form of a barn is indeed classic and familiar that it is only natural that we’re attracted to them. They dot the rural landscape with colour and iconic contours. Indoors, soaring spaces and rough-hewn timbers are pleasing too. So pleasing that it makes us want to kick the animals out and move ahead. Check out five converted barn or barn-inspired houses to find out if life in a barn is right for you.
A+B KASHA Designs
1. Normandy, France
When the owners of a b kasha layouts came across this barn/gardener’s residence in Normandy, they knew they’d found a job that would challenge and benefit them.
A+B KASHA Designs
Considering it after the renovation, it is difficult to believe that it still had dirt floors and mud walls when they began.
A+B KASHA Designs
Open space and rough-hewn beams ensure that they’ll never forget their residence’s humble yet charming roots.
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Sandvold Blanda Architecture + Interiors LLC
2. New Jersey
This exceptional house, made by Sandvold Blanda Architecture and Interiors, sits on a former plantation, and the house next door is still farmed, thus a barnlike style was a fitting choice.
Sandvold Blanda Architecture + Interiors LLC
The main part of the house (left side) was originally a barn construction from Vermont and has been bought as a bare shell.
Sandvold Blanda Architecture + Interiors LLC
While the exterior of the house fits right into its semirural landscape, the inside has an unexpected modern loft look. The designers took full advantage of all the open space the barn shell provides.
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Mark English Architects, AIA
3. California
I would swear that this home was a barn, but I’d be wrong. It was simply a dull house that architect Mark English gave barnlike allure. Elements such as stones, board and battan siding and rough-hewn timbers altered the home’s facade.
Mark English Architects, AIA
English made the house look like an assemblage of bits that was added on as time passes. This rock entrance looks like that of an old farmhouse in Tuscany or in Bucks County, Pennsylvania.
Mark English Architects, AIA
The barn inspiration gave this bedroom an excellent structure of rustic beams for sleepers to gaze up at from bed.
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4. Georgia
That really is my favorite house in my area (Virginia-Highland in Atlanta). The original house is a former dairy barn, and the accession to the left was designed by Samuel Mockbee, aka Sambo, the late founder of Rural Studio. I blogged about the house years back, and the beautiful owner saw the post and invited me over to get a ginger beer and a tour.
Although the area is now full of small lots and bungalows, the beautiful gardens on the property keep the soul of their original rural environment.
Fun fact: A editor at Metropolis was originally in touch with the homeowner regarding a story on Emma Gardner rugs (one is shown here), but if he found out the house had a Sambo-designed improvement, the attention of his story shifted suddenly.
5. Minnesota
Viewed by its vineyard’s vines, it is obvious from afar that this house designed by Bill Costello of Murphy & Co.. Design is something special.
It has the substantial existence and form of a barn, or two deconstructed barns, or a farmhouse and a barn intersecting with one another … I can not make my mind up, which explains the reason why it’s really intriguing.
Indoors, spacious amounts are flooded with light and have expansive views, which relate the massive building to its exquisite agricultural environment.
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More:
10 Beautiful Farmhouses
On an Architect’s Bucket List: To Reside in a Barn