Post And Beam Home Plans: Framing Plans?

Did the housewright forefathers have elaborate post and beam home plans and drawings for all these buildings and barns?

It is possible the average builder may have had one set of drawings for a typical frame that he liked.

But it is doubtful he was a good draftsman and more unlikely that he carried a drawing table around.

He probably worked from no drawings at all. Instead, he had a building design in his head along with a knowledge of joinery.

Barnes have been found, done by the same housewright, varying in size considerably, but having identical layout and joinery.

It was only toward the end of the post and beam era that books come out showing the latest styles of architecture, allowing the builder to show a client what the house would look like.

When selecting a post and beam home plans design for yourself, consider your space requirements.

The cape design works well for a couple with young children.

Second-level space can be cramped, but a family room or bedroom can be added on the ends, or a two-story addition is a possibility.

For a large family, the two-story colonial, one that lends itself to the saltbox shape, is more appropriate.

If you choose this design, you might find it more aesthetically pleasing to have a slight change in roof pitch in the middle of the long sloping rear roof.

With proper orientation, this design maximizes the benefits of southern exposure and, owing to the low height of the north wall, deflects cooling north winds over the house.

The orientation of the house may be routed 40 or 50 degrees from south, but it is not advisable to face the house north in northern climates.

Even the earliest post and beam home plans builders were concerned with orientation and siting.

The Fairbanks house, for example, was sited due south, as were many build in seventeenth-century America.

Somewhere in the past 50 years or so those ideas were left behind, to be revived when fuel costs rose.

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