After a hiatus of some time–our apologies–we are resurrecting the Barn of the Month with great news: the Washington State Legislature has funded another biennium of Heritage Barn Grants! There is approximately $450,000 available. The deadline for applications is May 17th, and remember that listing on the Heritage Barn Register is a necessary (but not … Continue reading
Latest Entries
July 2017: ERICKSEN BARN, PREVOST, STUART ISLAND
This (belated) Barn of the Month comes courtesy of Jim and Linda Bergquist (Linda is an Ericksen), who graciously let us visit their place on Stuart Island this last July, as part of a San Juan Islands National Monument tour. The Ericksen barn was built in 1908 by Erick Tobias Ericksen (1869-1934), who was born, raised, … Continue reading
June 2017: ELIZA WELCH’S DOWNTOWN FRIDAY HARBOR BARN REMODEL
Whew, are we ever behind! Here it’s almost September and we’re just getting around to writing the June Barn of the Month. Our pathetic excuse is that it’s summer, busy with tourists and all sorts of distractions. So we thought we’d talk tourism and affordable housing and other such contemporary topics. Here’s an item from … Continue reading
May 2017: KRUMDIACK HOMESTEAD BARN
Not all San Juan County barns are located on the four ferry-served islands (Lopez, Orcas, San Juan, and Shaw). The Krumdiack Homestead Barn is a witness to a time when it was just as easy (or difficult) to live and farm on a (now considered) remote island because everyone was travelling throughout the San Juans by boat. Friedrich Wilhelm Heinrich … Continue reading
April 2017: BEIGIN GRANARY
The April Barn of the Month is–hey, wait a second: the April Barn of the Month, on May 6th? So we’re a little (ok, a lot) behind…consider it a belated April Fool’s. As I was saying, the April Barn of the Month is somewhat appropriate in that it poses the April Fool’s riddle: when is a barn … Continue reading
March 2017: NORMAN HODGSON BARN
Some barns just jump out at you as you drive around the islands, and the Norman Hodgson Barn is one of them. Appropriately located on Hodgson Road, the simple grace of the wide spread of its gable roof is visible from a distance as you drive towards Richardson on the south end of Lopez Island. Norman … Continue reading
February 2017:WARM VALLEY FARM BARN
As you drive toward Eastsound from Orcas Landing, a valley soon opens up and you can see a low-slung barn on the right with two distinctive roof vents: Like the Hambly Apple House, this unique structure was originally used for fruit storage, and its form is signal to its purpose. This barn is one of … Continue reading
January 2017: BARN MAPS!
A belated New Years present, this “Barn of the Month” is actually about a multitude of barns: those that can be seen from the public right-of-way on the four ferry-served islands (Lopez, Orcas, San Juan, and Shaw). Ever since we designed this website, we’ve wanted to have interactive maps of barns. Now, due to generous help from … Continue reading
December 2016: KING BARN
This month we continue our ‘tour’ of historic island barns that are listed on the Washington Heritage Barn Register. The King Barn is sited on a rise above the Three Meadows pastureland and marsh on San Juan Island. If not the largest barn in the San Juan Islands, it is certainly the longest at 130-plus … Continue reading
November 2016: THOMAS GRAHAM GHOST BARN
Last year at this time we took the holidays and celebrations–Halloween (October 31st), All Saints’ Day (November 1st), and All Souls’ Day (November 2nd)–as an opportunity to introduce a fun feature of our website: Ghost Barns! Many barns in the San Juan Islands have been lost to fire, storms, old age, or demolition. To recognize these barns … Continue reading
Historic Barns of the San Juan Islands 