Log and Timber Home Living

A few days before we wrap up each issue of Log & Timber Home Living, I sit at my computer and stare at the digital equivalent of a blank piece of paper, contemplating the message I’m going to share with our readers. For anyone who’s ever had to write anything, that stark, white sheet can be intimidating. Writing those first few words is usually the hardest part (full disclosure … this was one of those times). But then, as I glared at my lonely, blinking cursor with contempt — literally on the morning we were shipping our files to the printer — I had an epiphany. This empty page isn’t a roadblock; it’s a launchpad to bring ideas to life. And that’s exactly what floor plans are to our readers, particularly…

Does your home need a refresh for the summer season (or any reason)? Start with the first thing guests see: your front door. Not only is it a prime place to express your personal style, it’s good for your wallet in more ways than one. Updating exterior doors can increase your home’s value — a 75 percent potential return-on-investment, according to Quality Overhead Door, (qualityoverheaddoor.com). Heed these ideas to put your home’s best face forward. Design The front door is often the first chance to set the tone for all that lies behind it. Pick complementary style choices instead of contrasting. A rough-sawn option with sturdy wood often fits the rustic log and timber home aesthetic. Paint/Stain Color Something as simple as changing your door’s color can have a major impact. If your door gets…

No matter if the square footage of your log or timber home falls in the quaint category or teeters toward grand, chances are you want it to feel like a sanctuary, perfectly nestled into the landscape and offering a sense of respite and relaxation. But what if you’re near a road or a bit too close to the neighbors? It might feel a little less private than you’d like. To create a more secluded space, fencing is the obvious option, but you’d usually need quite a bit of height and width for that endeavor, and that runs the risk of making your cabin and surrounding landscape go from cozy to cramped. Fortunately, there are plenty of plants that can create a natural border without blocking you in. Keep these living-fence essentials…

When Julie Engelmann and her husband Sean bought their home in Trenton, Illinois, nearly 20 years ago, it was just an old farmhouse, built in the 1960s and clocking in at just over 1,700 square feet. Now it has grown to approximately 3,700 square feet with six bedrooms and three bathrooms, and every space has been updated for the Engelmann family’s lifestyle, including a taxidermy room, as well as a pool and a pool house with its own custom bar. Here’s their farm-to-forever-home journey: Julie: We wanted a property in the country, and we saw the potential this place had. We love the location, and that’s really what it was about. You just can’t fix location, you know? Then, we just remodeled it little by little as we could until every…

Bringing some of those clean lines and striking angles from the exterior facade to the design of the interior features in the form of floating staircases, fireplaces and ceilings can maximize sightlines and make a statement. Here are three examples of ways to use an airy aesthetic to really make the interiors of your sky-high home stand out: Floating Stairs Unencumbered, floating staircases pose another place for framing up picturesque views and flexing some architectural flair. “Floating staircases really add to that open concept,” says Ethan Beiler, account executive for Mid-Atlantic Timberframes’ Mountain States division. “Timber framing works beautifully to incorporate wood into the design but doesn’t detract from keeping the space open.” Floating Fireplaces Ethan reports he’s being seeing a lot of floating chimneys, which allow a fireplace to take center stage without…

Before we can talk about the burgeoning new architectural style of the Mountain West, or even California’s crisp-but-casual influence on it – we must first take a trip across the globe to Barcelona, Spain. There, says Woodhouse, The Timber Frame Company architect Diana Allen, is an iconic example of the power of clean lines and modern design: the Barcelona Pavilion by Mies van der Rohe. A fusion of glass and sleek slabs of stone, it can feel geographically and aesthetically distant from the rustic, slope-side homes of the U.S. Mountain West, where log and timber structures are mosaics of local stone, wood and patinated metals. But it is, in fact, the iconic designs like the Barcelona Pavilion, whose modern strokes informed the cool and contemporary lines found across the West Coast and…