Amish Sheds, Board & Batten, Single Wall Construction

Inspired by Little House on the Prairie, I finally figured out what their style or wall construction is called. Board and batten.

Or more close-up/detail shot of similar technique:

And as applied in “real life”:

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And different people say different things about the nailing pattern. Some say you nail the batten through one board only and the other floats freely beneath it, while others say you nail the battens in between the boards only.

And via the American Historic Carpentry page on Wikipedia, I can say that probably the framing style beneath the board and batten cladding is single wall construction.

A few sample interior shots of single wall framing:

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Another one in Baton Rouge, Louisiana I’m not able to embed. (The above is in Barbados), and some cool shots here from a company building homes I think in Hawaii.

Anyway, I also watched this really interesting documentary by Folkways on the Amish from the 1970's:

And got around to looking at “Amish sheds”:

“I could get two Amish sheds for about half the price of a garage,” says Bruce Kidd, a retired manager from the automotive industry. “Not only that, but the way they’re made, they’ll outlast us.”

See also AmishSheds.ca in Ontario or West Quebec Shed Company in, that’s right, western Quebec. I haven’t been able to determine whether or not there are any Amish or Mennonite construction companies operating in Quebec. Found some old articles about Mennonite families leaving Quebec, and a church or two in Montreal, but that’s about it.

Anyway, I figured I can approximately clone the style myself, and put it to use as poultry housing. Since these things are typically built on rot-resistant skids (larch or hemlock), they are not fixed to the earth, are portable, and *probably* don’t need building permits.

Nice little Amish shed example — love the work on the door:

Bonus: Interior shot of framing from the same company, which as I recall roughly matches what I’ve seen in scenography from Little House:

Though mine will be maybe more like this, with a shed-style single roof:

And the original drawing that inspired this all from Handy Farm Devices and How to Make Them: