My Barn Conversion … musings in small-house, off-grid, architecture, design with smatterings of art, history and literature

The head torch, #1 in my favourite-tools-in-no-particular-order list. I used to think that head torches were mildly comical, rather strange things for grown men to wear. Then I started laying insulation in unlit attics and lighting fireworks in dark fields and my opinion transformed into a need to have one close to hand at all…

I suppose that I’ve been avoiding writing this post for quite some time, probably since not long after we started work on the barn and this blog. So, cards on the table, time to explore the dark-side(or at least some of the challenges) of barn conversions… There are a whole bunch of troubles that come…

Update on building progress during July 2011…

One of the problems with the way that this site has evolved is that I’ve missed some of the fundamental blocks upon which a site like this would normally be built. One of the most obvious of those is that I’ve never really described the barn and the conversion that we’re undertaking. An email I…

A review at the start of 2012 of my use of Christopher Alexanders design patterns at the barn.

Continued from Part 1 & Part 2… With the main structure safe and solid it was time to add some finishing touches. I’d wanted the bed to have it’s own lighting so went for LED strip lights from the ‘large blue Swedish chain store’. Two packs of four lights for a total of eight provided…

I must apologise if you’ve emailed me over the last few months. I know of a least one email (asking for some proper vital statistics related to the barn), that has disappeared down the drain hole of my spam filter. Communications with blog readers has become ever more difficult – the commercialisation of the Akismet…

Continued from Part 1… I was lucky when it came to fitting the cupboard doors under the bed as I’d sized the frame and the doors to fit and for once the plans and reality closely resembled one-another. With hinges fixed to the doors, they quickly and relatively easily screwed onto the frame. I then…

Update on building progress during July 2011…

I’m really rubbish at self promotion and promotion of this blog… one thread of evidence to that statement is that I’ve been on Twitter for a couple of years now, but have neglected to mention it here. I have stuck a Twitter link up on the header but never provided any explanation, so to put…

I don’t really talk about project management on this blog. I prefer to focus on my fumbling attempts at labouring, carpentry, landscape gardening and so on. But having decided against an architect and / or project manager way back at the start of converting the barn I’ve taken on the project management (above and beyond…

On the Vitsoe website is a list of ‘ten principles of good design’, that are as good a list of design principles as I’ve found.