The first steps to
having a great country place are to find a great site and then
to plan it well. Here are some ideas on how to look at property
and how to lay out buildings on your land.
In a case that recently occurred
near a country town at some distance from New York, a road was
run through a very beautiful estate, one agreeable feature of
which was a pretty though small pond that, even in the dryest
seasons, was always full of water, and would have formed an
agreeable adjunct to a country-seat. A single straight
pencil-line on the plan doubtless marked out the direction of
the road; and as this line happened to go straight through the
pond, straight through the pond was the road accordingly
carried, the owner of the estate personally superintending the
operation, and thus spoiling his sheet of water, diminishing the
value of his lands, and increasing expense by the cost of
filling in, without any advantage whatever: for a winding road
so laid out as to skirt the pond, would have been far more
attractive and agreeable than the harsh, straight line that is
now scored like a railway track clear through the undulating
surface of the property; and such barbarisms are of constant
occurrence. Points of this nature deserve the utmost attention,
instead of the reckless disregard they generally meet with. When
once a road is laid out, its fate is settled, and no alteration
is likely to be made: it is, therefore, the more desirable that
its direction should be well studied in the first instance.
Improve Your Country Property
Build a shed, deck, gazebo, arbor, pergola, greenhouse, small
barn, playhouse or garden bridge with these plans and DIY
building kits.
Homestead Help on the eBackroad Find
home and garden tools, products, furnishings and more. Check out
the free plans for country buildings and woodwork projects.
Country Outbuildings Plans, prefabs and
easy building kits for horse barns, garages, sheds, pole barns,
work shops and country outbuildings.
