Between Friday, August 23rd to Saturday, August 31st, a team of 35 professional timber framers from France, England, Slovenia, Estonia, and the US who specialize in historic hand-tool methods will be constructing a 16’ x 26’ timber frame outbuilding/blacksmith shop adjacent to the Mortise & Tenon Magazine woodshop in Sedgwick, Maine.
This team, Charpentiers sans Frontiers (Carpenters Without Borders), is led by François Calame, ethnologist in the Ministry of Culture in Normandy. Usually they are restoring medieval masterpieces like Château d'Harcourt, Château de Gaillon, or a 1491 barn in Alcou. CSF does at least one of these events per year and M&T is grateful to be chosen for their 2019 project. François and his crew are supportive of the efforts of M&T to promote human-powered, pre-industrial craftsmanship in the 21st century, and are enthusiastic to donate their expertise, sweat, and time to the cause.
John Ellsworth, local farmer and timber framer, has horse-logged the trees with Jay and Jackson, his pair of veteran Suffolk Punch horses. When the crew arrives on the 23rd to these freshly cut white pine logs, they will hew them into timbers with their antique axes, cut joinery with hand tools, and raise the building (think Amish barn raising) in one week.
Three days during this project will be open for visitors to watch the progress: Monday 26th (primarily hewing logs), Wednesday 28th (joinery and possibly some hewing), and Saturday 31st (raising the frame). The hours for visitation are 2 pm – 5 pm. Outside of these three slots, the site will not be open for visitation in order to maintain focus on the immense amount of work to be done.
The address to the event is:
Mortise & Tenon Magazine
14 Porcupine Ln
Sedgwick, Maine 04676
Google Maps location here: https://goo.gl/maps/LVmsngEZEsjggHao6
Any questions can be sent to info@mortiseandtenonmag.com
We hope you can join us!
Joshua Klein, editor