GREEN SOLUTIONS: RECLAIMED EXTERIORS
NEW LIFE FOR OLD WOOD
By Andrew Miller / Photos by Carter Photographics

One way that Grand County builders are going green is by using reclaimed and locally sourced materials for home exteriors. Richly hued reclaimed barn wood lumber not only stands up well to our severe climate, it can give a new home historical roots.

The three R’s of conservation are Reduce, Reuse and Recycle. Reuse keeps new products from being manufactured and gives renewed life to items destined for the landfill. Les Watkins, owner of LD Watkins Construction Services, adds another advantage of reclaimed wood siding: the use of barn wood helps the farmer. With bigger equipment and larger farms, many old barns don’t serve a useful purpose anymore, and the farmer can get some income from tearing down his barn.

Will barn wood siding last? Experienced Grand County builders know a combination of high altitude sun, extremely low humidity and huge temperature swings raise havoc with exterior materials. Splitting and cupping can be seen on pine-covered local structures, especially on the south face (the side most prone to sun and temperature damage). In many cases, it took 70 years for this damage to occur. Some barn wood reclaimed from the Midwest and East has been in the weather for more than 100 years and is still sound.

Jamie Smith, owner of Cabin Creek Carpentry, has sided five county homes with barn wood. He believes the wood is stable in our climate. ‘When you scrape the surface off the siding, you find the old wood underneath is harder,” adding that driving nails into salvaged beams is almost impossible.

David McKnight of Larson & McKnight Construction is keeping the historical nature of a local building by preserving its old materials. He is turning what was once the Tabernash Post Office into the town’s only restaurant. “We are taking some of the stamped metal which we found under the siding and keeping it, along with salvaging metal from inside the building for use on the outside.” Keeping the historical theme, the false front on the new addition to the building will be tumbled brick to resemble old brick facades.

When it came to making a historical front for the new Grand Mountain Bank in Granby, McKnight took a different approach. He was concerned about the life span of barn wood siding on the sun-baked south side of the building, so he used cedar siding. Painter Tom Jones, owner of TJ Enterprises, and George Wylie in Granby’s Country Hardware paint shop matched the barn wood color by brewing a combination of stains followed by light burning.

Another approach in using new material to re-create the patina of barn wood is to use locally rough-cut beetle-kill logs with one of two available finishes. Cindy Hester at Hester’s Log and Lumber, one source of this rough-cut material, sells FSC Coatings – a low-cost powder which is mixed with water and applied to the wood, creating the grey tones found in barn wood.

Lifetime™ Wood Treatment is a non-toxic wood treatment powder which is also mixed with water. With the beetle epidemic leading to huge piles of useful logs, locally milled siding is an excellent green alternative for exteriors. The wavy edge look (where the lower edge of lap siding is left with the log profile) is available at Granby Sawmill and Hester’s Log and Lumber. Hester’s also mills the popular hand-hewn log-slab siding which is “chinked” to give a squared-log house appearance to a stick-framed home.

Because barn wood is put up untreated, the cost of the siding can be a wash when compared to cedar or other typical stained-wood siding products. To help save costs, Smith has become a bit of a sleuth – looking for ways to buy directly from barns being demolished in the Great Plains and the East. “Tax law changes have made it cheaper to own vacant land, leading to the destruction of many old barns,” Smith says.

Contractors are especially sensitive to maintenance issues. “My building is very close to U.S. 40 in Granby,” Watkins says, “which means road grime will cause problems with modern materials. With barn wood, this just adds to the look over the years.”

Interior barn wood, a popular wall covering in recreation rooms in the 70s, is finding a place indoors again. McKnight and crew completed the walls in the Club Car Restaurant (at the Mary Jane base) two years ago. Take a look there or at any number of local homes to see if barn wood might provide the perfect historical look for your new structure. All these products promise to put a handsome, earth-friendly face on new Grand County homes.


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