I love old barns.  I photograph them on vacations and use a barn in our farm's logo.  I really love our old barn.  Not because it has any particularly flashy architecture or stands out amongst other barns -- I just love it because it is OUR barn. 

When we moved to the farm, even before we decided we wanted to open an on-farm business, we knew preserving the barn would be a priority.  I'll cover more of the before & after of restoring the barn in a future post.  Today I wanted to share with you one of my favorite parts of our old barn.

The barn overall is very "no nonsense" and practical, without any real bells and whistles.  That's why I love these support straps on the sliding hay loft door so much.  Their decorative star cutouts are an exception to the strictly-business hardware on all other parts of the building. 

To learn more about barn history, preserving a historic barn, or for a really cool barn-related road trip, visit these links:

National Barn Alliance

The Barn Journal - "Dedicated to the preservation of traditional farm acritechture."

Sac County, Iowa's Barn Quilts