With Hammer in Hand, Come Raise a Barn

    The Amagansett Historical Association will host a “mini barn-raising” on Saturday at 2 p.m. on its property at 129 Main Street, at the corner of Windmill Lane. Volunteers have been invited to help raise the beams and hammer in the trunnels (oak pegs), using simple hand tools, the way they used to.

    The event is intended to demonstrate, albeit on a small scale, how post-and-beam structures are assembled, said Peter Garnham, the association’s director.

    “There’s quite a bit of interest in that type of framing now,” he said, “not just for historic-type structures but as houses, small houses, and barns. We thought it was an appropriate place to do it because we’re a historical association, and this is a historical method of framing houses.”

    Mr. Garnham noted that the Miss Amelia Cottage, which is on the site, was built by a similar method in 1725.

    David and Jeanie Stiles of Stiles Designs, authors and publishers of how-to books about similar structures, such as tree houses, sheds, and cabins, will be on hand at the event. The Stileses, who have written 22 books on wooden buildings, were inspired by a visit to an Amish community in upstate New York to design a timber-framed shed “small enough that it could fit on a flatbed truck, less expensive than adding on to your existing house, and simple enough to construct that it could be put together in a day simply by hammering in wooden pegs,” they wrote in a e-mail.

    The structure that will be assembled on Saturday could serve as an artist’s studio, a writer’s retreat, a pool house, a home office, a guesthouse, or a yoga-meditation sanctuary, the Stileses suggested. What the historical association will use it for remains to be seen.

    Refreshments will be served. The rain date is Sunday.