Two obvious advantages are the addition of floor space upstairs, and protection of the lower floor and foundation from the weather. Opinions differ on the exact function of these cantilevered overhangs. Half-Timbered house in Plovdiv, Bulgaria affectionately known as the “Upside-Down Wedding Cake” house.Īnother common characteristic of half-timbered houses are upper floors which slightly extend out over the lower ones. But tourist villages today want all the medieval charm possible, so they leave the ribs visible and paint the stucco panels a kaleidoscope of colors. In some cases the entire structure was covered with a mixture of plaster and lime, and in others only the panels between the ribs were covered. The finished product was a house turned inside out with the skeleton on the outside. It is one of the finest examples of timber-framed domestic architecture in England.Īfter the split-log frame was built, the spaces between the structural members were filled with bricks, plaster, or wattle and daub, which is a clever concoction of woven twigs and branches that were smeared with clay or mud. Little Moreton Hall is a moated 15th and 16th-century half-timbered manor house in Cheshire. And if you guessed that each and every step was grueling, backbreaking work, you’d be right. But each house needed hardwood trees of a similar size, split down the middle and cut into ribs which would be joined with wooden pegs. Standard construction rules didn’t exist at the time, so the building process varied from place to place. France, Germany, the UK, and Eastern Europe have the largest collections of these lovely tourist magnets. So Europe’s half-timbered houses are concentrated where the thick forests were, at least in the 16th Century. In a rocky area the buildings were stone and in heavily forested places they used wood for construction. It came to Britain with the Saxons in the 5th Century.” Bacharach, GermanyĪll medieval structures, from the lowliest hut to the grandest palace had one thing in common: building material had to be close at hand. Colmar, FranceĪnd why half-timber? Basically, this term refers to the primary building method of cutting a whole log in half to form the ribs of the sturdy frame … half a timber.Īccording to “Half Timbering was a vernacular construction technique that evolved in Germanic Saxony. They’re called half-timbered houses, and given the number of these lovely 500 year-old beauties scattered across Northern Europe it’s obvious why this medieval construction technique was so popular: it stood the test of time. One look at their wonky, out of square frames, colorful stucco, and overflowing flower boxes and it’s immediately obvious that you’re in another place, another time. They’re the quintessential symbol of old European charm.
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