Page Updated: Friday, 14 December, 2007

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Paul Price - Woodwrights


Traditional Structural Timberwork

 

 

 

I design, make and raise, traditionally jointed, oak and fir structures for projects throughout Ireland. Each project is custom made and very individual as the frame must complement and enhance the building.
For the past 16 years I have specialized almost exclusively in
traditionally jointed post and beam buildings: repairing historic frames and making new oak frames for houses and garden structures and tower house castles.
I like to work in oak for its toughness,
durability and its unique character. All joints are "drawpegged" with handmade oak pegs to pull joints tight initially and to give a tendency to take up shrinkage. Inevitably, as unseasoned timber dries, checking and shrinkage gaps do occur but the frames remain rigid and attractive due to the traditional methods of framing and pegging.
Historic oak framed barns, houses and church buildings were made using the European method of frame layout called Scribe Carpentry. This is the method I use in my work having learned much from repairing many old buildings.
I design the frame, sometimes working with engineers and architects. After drawings and a contract are agreed I source the timber and then work on framing, jointing and finishing the timberwork in my workshop in Co. Carlow..

The framing work may take many weeks and when the work is ready I deliver it to the site and raise it often with the help of a crane. Each finished timber bears a chiseled carpenters number to ensure it positioned correctly in the finished frame. As the frame is fully scribed, fitted and jointed in the workshop it may only take one to three days to raise on site - very rewarding and exciting after so many hours of work in the workshop.

Recent projects include:
• Two new oak towerhouse roofs and heavy beamed floor timbering, for Ballytarsna Castle, Co. Tipperary, and Clougheast Castle, Co. Wexford.
• A mezzanine bridge and adjacent 2-storey oak stairs in a barn conversion.
• A hexagonal gazebo and a heavy oak pergola with interesting natural curved beams.
• Roof trusses and windbraced purlins on standard blockwork walls for house extensions in Carlow and Tipperary.
• A large kitchen roof comprising oak kingpost trusses, purlins and octagonal end.
• A Greek garden folly with a facade melding traditional timber work with Doric classical proportions.
• A fully oak framed storey-and-a-half sling braced extension to a farmhouse in Waterford, now thatched.

Currently (Jan 2007), Decorative oak roof and screen for a towerhouse castle in Galway.

Contact details:

Paul Price and Éilis McDonnell Tel/Fax 01 2809 887
9 Rosary Gardens East, Library Rd, Dun Laoghaire Co. Dublin Ireland
Email - woodwrights@iolfree.ie

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