Traditional barns can be found in every settlement and valley in the Lake District; there are thousands of them across the whole of the National Park, some remain in agricultural use, many have been converted to homes or other uses, but there are a large number which appear to have no beneficial use and may be in poor condition. Whilst it is true that many of our field barns and outlying hogg houses do not have an economic use; their contribution to the historic environment, cultural landscape and natural environment of the Lake District is invaluable.
Traditional barns not only demonstrate the agro-pastoral practices for which the Lake District was inscribed as a World Heritage Site, they also provide valuable habitats for owls, bats, birds and other small mammals. Traditional barns were often built with owl holes incorporated into the gable wall and the nature of the rubble construction and slate roofs provides an ideal habitat for bats and small birds to utilise.
Repairing traditional buildings is an inherently sustainable thing to do; energy has gone into winning the raw materials, transporting them to site and constructing the building, along with the effort of ongoing maintenance over time. For vernacular buildings, the embodied carbon is often lower than most new buildings as the materials used are natural, sustainable and sourced from the local area, thereby reducing carbon emissions from any manufacturing processes or transportation. Repairing and where possible reusing existing buildings will almost always have a lower carbon footprint than putting up a new building.
Traditional barns are therefore providing a number of public goods which are crucial for maintaining the historic and natural environment of the Lake District. Conserving and repairing these traditional buildings delivers multiple benefits for people and wildlife, as demonstrated in the barn repair projects completed over the past 4 years. Between 2019 and 2022, 10 barns across the National Park were repaired as part of a DEFRA funded pilot project jointly managed by Historic England and Natural England, with the Lake District National Park leading delivery on the ground.
At Bank End Farm, a Grade II listed bank barn, many of the original roof timbers were waney larch (timber with bark on) and rather than use a standard treated soft wood, locally felled and milled larch was used to replace any sections which were no longer structurally sound. The local larch was also used for joinery work to the pentice porch and new doors; this resulted in carbon savings by reducing transport costs but sourcing the timber locally also put more money back into the local economy.
Where the existing roofing slates can be re-used this is always the best approach, but often new slates do need to be sourced to replace broken or failed slates. New roofing slate is always sourced from slate quarries in Cumbria; this is essential to maintain local building character, ensure the integrity of the built environment and reduce the carbon emissions due to much lower transport costs. Although the upfront cost of local slate is higher than imported slate, the quality and longevity is significantly higher, the carbon footprint is substantially lower and there is an economic benefit of keeping the money in the local area.
At Arklid Barn, the wildlife survey conducted prior to the works identified use of the barn by both owls and bats. The capital work was programmed to cause the least disturbance to wildlife and completed within 3 months. The following spring the farmer reported seeing both owls and bats using the building again and within 6 months of the repair work having been completed, a brood of Tawny Owl chicks had been raised and fledged.
Similar positive wildlife stories have been relayed from other sites repaired as part of the scheme; with owls returning and continuing to use the buildings post repair work. Without repair, many of these barns would have been lost and with them the habitats they provided.
As we think about ways to reduce our carbon footprint and live more sustainably the historic environment is often not at the forefront of everyone’s minds, but these traditional buildings can offer us some useful pointers about sustainable living which were being practised centuries ago; source local sustainable materials, reduce transportation as much as possible, repair not replace, repurpose rather than demolish and make space for wildlife in your buildings.
