In 2005, an ambitious plan was taking hold in Raymond Lawson's mind. Eager to build a country home in picturesque Prince Edward County, Ontario, he was considering any number of options until finally, the light dawned. "Why don't we convert a barn?" he suggested to his wife, Margaret.* "We'd seen it done time and again in France and England, and I couldn't see why we couldn't do it here."

Raymond was on to something. There are obvious advantages to transforming a workaday barn into living quarters: It couldn't help but radiate genuine country charm and likewise, the old, hand-hewn timbers would lend a time-honoured appeal. And with its cathedral ceiling, the cavernous hay mow could be readily adapted to open-concept living. Or could it? Canadian barns are larger than their European cousins, perhaps too big for residential use? And maybe too hard to find in good condition? Raymond wondered aloud if his idea was practical, but he didn't know where to turn for help.

So he googled "Ontario barns."

One of the links that popped up on the computer screen was the Wood Source, an upscale Ottawa-area lumber yard that also salvages and brokers old timber frames. They just happened to know of an 1830s barn for sale. For the time being, it stood on its original site at Sheffield Mills in the Annapolis Valley near Wolfville, Nova Scotia, but it was doomed by indifferent maintenance over several decades that had produced sizeable cracks in the stone foundation. However, the roof was true and the structural frame was still in top form. The beams stood 13 feet tall; from the sill to the ridge was 32 feet - impressive, all right. It would be a shame to see all this good wood go to waste, so this wasn't going to be any ordinary demolition. Every post, every timber, every beam would be salvaged. Only the clapboards, weathered beyond re-use, would be left behind. All that was needed was a buyer with the imagination to put the components to new use.

Raymond flew out to see for himself. "I liked what I saw," he says, recalling, "The posts were solid 8-by-8s. Some of the sills and beans were no less than 50 feet long." But Raymond was also impressed by more than dimensions: Unlike some barns, which adopt a longer, more linear plan, this one boasted an almost square footprint - 40 by 50 feet - more adaptable to family living. But the real trump card was the fact that the barn stood "double-sheathed," that is, the exterior was lined with plank boards as well as a layer of clapboard. "We could hide a lot of plumbing and insulation in the space in-between," Raymond continues. "What's more, we could minimize the use of drywall - the planks, visible on the interior, had mellowed to a lovely and authentic patina that would add greatly to the character of the project."

As the building came down, Raymond kept track with a camera. Each component was assigned a number and its position plotted on a plan as a guide for reconstruction. "The demolition was purposely done in the spring, so that there would be no worry about inadvertent water damage in winter storage," he says. In fact, Raymond saw no need to delay at all, because he already had to the ultimate destination in mind. After the components were scoured clean and the nails removed, they were on their way to a new site in Ontario.

Raymond and Margaret chose 14 fallow acres, high on a bluff, a locale typical of Prince Edward County. An agricultural enclave that was until recently a well-kept secret, this picturesque island of Loyalist-era farms is known for its varied rural scenery. At every turn, it seems there is another ridge or bluff and at the top is a distant vista over the waters of Lake Ontario. Raymond was admiring one of those views when he was contemplating real estate, saying to himself, "If I could only find a lookout like this!" Little did he know that a little further along the road, he would find a picturesque parcel for purchase.

The County had held on to it agricultural roots, so a barn like the Lawsons' could never look out of place. Even so, passersby were taken aback as they watched the frame rise on the new site. This, of course, was not to be an authentic restoration: After all, the walls would be punched with windows and there would be other amenities - like a front door - to make it obvious that the cows had long since left the building. Still, "our goal was to re-build the barn to be as true to the past as possible," Raymond says. To that end, the windows adopt the colonial style and were placed in a regular arrangement modeled after historical proportions. The new clapboard adopts the same profile as the old and was left to weather to a faded barnboard patina.

Even more to the point, the new footprint is the same as the original and the frame was re-assembled verbatim.

As might be assumed, the placement of the posts and beams was the most significant factor in determining the layout of rooms and amenities. But the fine tuning presented dozens of architectural options, so early on, Raymond enlisted the advice of an architect, namely Michael Neelin of Ottawa, who often works with Wood Source clients, to make sense of it all. "Maintaining the heritage character was only one of my priorities," advises Raymond. "We also wanted to take advantage of views over the lake, and I also insisted that all the main functions - living area, master suite and kitchen - be clustered on the main floor, keeping in mind that climbing stairs may be an issue for us someday." With these criteria in mind, Michael fashioned an imaginative floor plan replete with overlooks and galleries that fit handily within the cathedral dimensions of the hay mow. Raymond admits it wasn't always easy for all three major players - architect, contractor and client - to remain on the same page, but they had a secret weapon: "We each had a copy of Barn Preservations and Adaptation, a 2003 coffee-table book full of ideas, concepts and technical information. Whenever there was a point of discussion among us, it was our common reference point."
From demolition to finishing touches, the project was swiftly executed and although another person might have flinched, never once did Raymond doubt the project would be a success. "You have to have an eye for this kind of thing," he says. "It might be hard for some to imagine that a pile of 175-year-old posts and beams can be transformed into something special." But a seasoned observer can see the beauty in the old hand-hewn timbers, each of which still bears the marks of the axeman who felled and shaped the timbers over a century ago. You just can't get that look from new lumber, Raymond says. It makes the project all the more worthwhile."

* Wishing to maintain their privacy, the couple featured in this story asked that we withhold their names. The author has substituted pseudonyms.