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Farmers Porch On Colonial Style House
Farmers Porch
When I designed our new house my wife only had a couple of must haves. The biggest wish on her list was a full length farmers porch. I was skeptical at first because I wasn’t exactly sure how our large colonial style home would look with such a large porch on it. As it turns out I think it turned out to be the defining architectural feature of our home and it’s best asset!
Farmers porches are also one of the biggest requests that we get from prospective buyers at work. As beautiful as they are it’s important to realize how expensive they can be. The average farmers porch can cost between $15,000 and $25,000 to build.
Farmers Porch Features
Our farmers porch is 6 ft deep and it wraps around a porch of the house to connect the front entry with the mud room entry. The roof has a 3:12 pitch in order to fit below the second floor windows.
It also features vinyl posts and railings and vinyl beadboard ceilings. We selected cambara decking for the stairs and decking which adds a very elegant finished look.
If you’re interested in learning more about the details of this farmers porch then I suggest you read:
In addition to the aesthetic value of this farmers porch it creates an excellent area to sit with family and friends in the summer. I know its been the most complimented feature of our new home and one that we are very glad we spent the money on. If you can afford the extra expense then I suggest you add a beautiful farmers porch to your new home or existing one.
Related posts:
- Farmers Porch “Skirt”
- Farmers Porch Design Drawing
- Custom Colonial House Plans
- Farmer’s Porch Lattice Skirt
- Colonial Home Exterior Design Features
This is one of the things we have to replace on the Stone House project. Although not orginal to the building, a farmers porch was added on sometime in the 1940’s and has since fallen. We love the idea of a farmer’s porch and so will be adding it back into the facade of the Stone House. Love your farmer’s porch! It turned out great.
I agree the Farmers Porch gives the home so much more features. I love it~!
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I love these porches. Your wife is spot on. They are gorgeous.
Your home, actually, looks very much like the look we STARTED with on our last custom home. It morphed into something much different, but you can see we certainly ended up with LOTS of porches. (The back, which was a walk-out, also had two levels of balconies.)
We had one HUGE problem with them, however. The builder sloped them slightly–as per our instructions–so they wouldn’t get flooded with water/snow. But when the guy came to do the finish work, he put flashing on the edge, which raised the edge back UP. Then, when the spray coat was applied, we ended up with a little pool running the entire length of all the decks.
This was worse on the captain’s walk on the roof, as you can imagine, and caused leaking into the playroom. Over and over.
Lesson learned: make sure your builder is EXPERIENCED with balconies/decks. What a nightmare.
Still going to put a front porch and big covered balcony in the back. But we’ll do a better job this time!
Oh, in case you want to see our last custom home with it’s many porches, it’s here:
http://www.seerstonehomes.com/curse-of-a-large-home/286
BTW, you’re a lucky man that your wife only had a COUPLE of “must-haves”! Both my husband and I have so many constraints on our homes that the design is by far the most difficult part!
@ Alison – Sounds like you guys learned some very valuable lessons about how important it is to build decks and balconies properly. I can’t ever stress enough home important drainage and flashing is around a new home.
Do you have before and after pictures? We would like to add a farmer’s porch to a colonial house, but there are only two steps up to the porch and was wondering if that would affect the look.
Thanks,
Karen Williams
@ Karen – The only before are during construction. Send me an email and I’ll forward them along.
Hi, I own a Garrison in north Massachusetts, and we’re considering adding a farmer’s porch to the front of the house. I can’t find ANY info on contractors that would specialize doing this… can I see your before and afters, and how did you find the contractor to do this? Any info is helpful.
Thank you
@ Carl – No real before and after because we built the house this way from the beginning. The company that I work for built this house. I designed it and crews that I supervise built it. The thing to do is find a small local architect that can draw some sketches for you. Most good contractors can then build it.
[...] and much more reliable than the old standby “sono tubes”. I used them for my front farmers porch and my large rear deck of my new home. I haven’t had any settlement problems or other issues. [...]
Great looking porch!! Me and my fiance are building a very similar colonial. My father in law who will be handling the construction insist on casement windows for a solid seal. I like the harvey casements that have the grids to look like double-hungs. I’m not completely sure about the functionality on the porch, as well as the look of casements on a colonial. I’m really struggling with this, any advice would be appriciated.
Thanks,
Tom
@ Tom – Thanks for the compliment! You can actually have the casements built with grids and a special cross bar at mid height to simulate a double hung window. We’ve built several homes with those and they actually look pretty good from the street. I’m not a huge fan of casements for two reasons: first they are much more expensive, two they are harder to maintain. However, they do seal better and if you don’t plan on opening them too often then it’s really a moot point.
Best of luck! Check out their triple pane glass. We just built a house with it and it made an AMAZING difference!
Personally I don’t like casements on the ground floor near a walkway or on a porch. The casements stick out and can be run into, especially by kids running (we have two). My preference for a porch or ground floor near paths or driveways would be double hung windows, even though they don’t seal quite as well as the casements do.
@ Bill – Those are double hungs!
I love your entire house! Is there anyway you can tell me a little bit about the inside layout. # of bedrooms, bathrooms, etc.,
@ Tina – This house is a 4 bedroom (with an additional bonus room…office..study..playroom type thing), two baths up stairs, one is a master bath suite. First floor has an open concept with large mud/laundry room, kitchen, breakfast nook, living room, family room, foyer, bathroom, and dining room. Total of about 3,400 sq. ft.