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Dancing Oaks

         In May of 2008, a two hundred year old timber framed church changed ownership.  Ellen Bargeron had visions of a sanctuary nestled among elderly trees, a stream fed pool, and a small rolling cemetery.  The bulk of her dream was realized two and a half years later when she moved into her code compliant home in its nine acre woods, 16 miles from its original location.  No stream ripples nearby, but one grave sadly graces the grounds.

         The building was a primitive 30 x 50 feet rectangle with small doors and windows.  The heart pine, hand hewn timber frame structure is intact.  The walls were extended up two feet to better display the timbers, keeping the original ratio of the gabled roof.  Larger and more numerous windows and doors allow more natural light.  All doors are eight feet solid fir and French glass paned.  All downstairs windows are triple and functional. They nestle against the timber at the top, reaching to 32 inches above the floor in the side rooms and 24 inches in the big room.  The width of all functioning windows is similar; those upstairs are double, rather than triple.  The 4x4 foot window in the master bath is fixed. 

The front entrance remains on the long south wall of the house; a side entrance opens into the kitchen.  A large back porch extends almost the width of the north wall, its high roof designed to allow an unimpeded view of the woods beyond through two sets of double doors.  These doors open completely connecting the big room with the porch. 

The renovation design utilizes natural resources, energy efficiency, and links the inner and outer spaces.  Passive solar details, cross-ventilation, thorough insulation, water conservation, and underground utilities are only part of the overall plan.  Minimal trees were removed for the driveway, house site, and the corridor for transporting the building.

An interior wall and ceilings were added on each end to facilitate private spaces with open lofts above. The east end houses the master suite with bedroom, bath, study, and laundry; above is a parlor.  The west end houses the guest bedroom and main bath with a spacious kitchen open to the big room; above is another bedroom.  The ceilings in these rooms are 12 feet, lofts are gabled from 11 to 7 feet, while the big room’s gable is 22 to 15 feet.

The 13 feet by 28 feet back porch is screened with one door opening to a small low porch on the west side.  Its roof is gabled from 20 to 14 feet.

Given the plethora of natural wood in the interior, the trim, flooring, wall colors, counters, and fixtures were chosen for their simplistic harmony, consistency, and natural materials.  All the trim (door & window frames, baseboards & shoe molding, bookcase edging) was cut from 150 year old Douglas Fir timbers.  The flooring was milled from 150 year old heart pine timbers.  The posts supporting the side porch are solid heart pine with cast iron capitals recovered from a 1920’s mill in North Carolina.  All porch roof rafters are the original heart pine roof rafters of the church.  Identical posts and rafters will be used for the front porch posts.

The house is indeed a sanctuary nestled among elderly trees.  It is named for Ellen’s favorite tree on the property, the dancing white oak that overlooks the west end of the house and the 26 foot granite picnic table, transported from the original church site.  It’s a place for celebration as well as contemplation.

The screened back porch is almost as spacious as the big room.  Two sets of double french doors connect the two rooms linking the outside with the inside physically as well as visually.

A view from the west loft shows the front entrance and windows.  In this image you can see the floor is made from random width boards.  The timbers were cut into tongue and groove flooring.

The view from the east loft to the west loft accentuates the stage-set look of the lofts which are both open to the big room.  Both have storage in the north and south walls, doors are normal sized, but door hardware is from a turn of the century home.

A view from the east loft gives some sense of height of the space.  To understand scale, all doors are eight feet and furniture is normal to large.

This view of one end of the master bath shower shows the 12x12 tile used in both bathrooms.  The accent tile and granite countertops are different.  Cabinets in both baths are identical with the kitchen cabinets, fixtures are white porcelain and brushed nickel.

The big closet in the master bedroom has sliding heart pine pocket doors from a turn of the century Victorian house.  The hardware shown here is usually hidden within the wall above the doors.

The master bedroom is in the northeast corner with room enough for three closets and a sitting area.  The morning sun and evening moon are visible through the three windows on the east wall.

A look into the guest bedroom from the upper closet helps capture the openness wrought by twelve foot ceilings and lots of glass.

The guest bedroom on the southwest corner has the atmosphere of a log cabin bedroom.  It's closet connects with the kitchen closet and the view is magnificent.

The end wall of the U-shaped kitchen shows the clean details of the cabinet design and hardware.  With so much wood in the house, simplicity was necessary to maintain a sense of calmness.

All the cabinets and trim in the house are from 150 year old Douglas Fir timbers; the profiles and hardware are consistent throughout.  The granite counter tops are sister slabs in three and four foot widths.  Appliances, sinks, and fixtures are all brushed steel or nickel.  Lighting is unobtrusive.

The panorama from the southeast corner of the big room offers a glimpse of the western loft bedroom and the a notion of the original dove-tailed timber frame structure, still strong after 200 years.

The panorama taken into the kitchen and clockwise from there gives a sense of how expansive the big room feels.  Lots of glass and a twenty-four feet floor to ceiling peak balance the massive hand hewn timbers maintaining the openness of the original structure.  All the flooring one the main floor, except tile bathrooms, is made from 150 year old heart pine timbers.

This granite slab picnic table held many 'dinners on the grounds' at the church.  We moved it in three pieces from its home, gave it new concrete legs, and had to shorten it due to a crack in one of the slabs.  It's twenty-six feet long.

The view from the north with native sparkle berries obscuring a good look at the very tall back porch.  The pipe coming out of the porch roof is for a wood stove in the big room.

A view from the west shows both side and back porches, large formerly foundation rocks edge the raised beds with barely budding landscapes.  The back porch rafters were formerly the church roof rafters--hand hewn heartpine.

A view of the southwest corner shows the side / kitchen, and most used entrance.  Solid heartpine columns and an old pine beam link with the church's original roof rafters to support the porch roof over which a second story deck (maybe porch ... undecided) will be built with access through the upper bedroom doorway.  All the big rocks used to line the garden beds originally formed the foundation pillars of the church.

The south facing front of the house utilizes the same main entrance placement the church did and is aligned to have solar panels on the large roof. All doors and windows are new and energy efficient.

We are heading down the driveway to Dancing Oaks, the house barely visible through the fall foliage.