Last weekend we were honored and delighted to lead the community of Hinesburg in raising a 24×30 pavilion for their new town common. The conversation started a year ago when the town approached us about a simple hip-roofed pavilion — it finished with something rather more than that. We landed on a design featuring White Ash tree forks at the four corners, one arm supporting the half-lapped plates while the other reaches up and inward to support the hips. Curved Hemlock logs cross at the middle bents, with a third curving over those from end to end. Its gentle S-shape — centered where it meets the crossing logs and supports posts up into the ridge — leaves it dancing to either side at the ends, a touch of asymmetry and natural spice.
Finding those giant curves took a little gnashing of teeth and nibbling of nails, but our sawyer Mike Gendron and his network of loggers came through yet again. Jamie and Steve (TreeDogs LLC) kept a weather eye peeled and found us four gorgeous Ash forks. The new bridge crane proved its worth, moving 1,500 lb logs delicately into a full-scale scribe setup. This piece-on-piece, one-joint-at-a-time approach let us land the curved tie logs, then the log posts for hips and ridge, and finally the hips themselves — each in their proper place. Testing all the rafters in the shop gave us further confidence that raising day would go smoothly.
And so it did. The predicted rain held off to the mildest drizzle. Fourteen enthusiastic Hinesburgians showed up at 7:30 for coffee and a conversation about ripe tomatoes, timbers, toes, fingers and peg holes. The raising unfolded in three parts: hand-raising the plates on their posts, then Sargent’s Crane Service setting the Hemlock log ties, ridge and hips, and finally handing up the rafters. In keeping with tradition, a fair maiden from the community thanked the druids with an evergreen bough purloined from a nearby planting and secured at the peak.
We’ve raised a number of public pavilions over the years, but this one set a new bar — donations of funds, concrete, formwork, roofing and food, and one of the best hand raisings I’ve been part of. Congratulations, Hinesburg! May this bring shade and shelter to your new common for years to come. – Josh Jackson
