Style considerations for oak framed builds

17.07.2026

9 minute read

Carpenter Oak Show Barn at Sunrise in East Cornworthy

Timber frame design offers unparalleled potential for getting character and beauty into your timber framed home, extension or other space, which is so often missing from conventional builds.

Split levels, mezzanines, floor to ceiling glazing, breathtaking roof spaces, open living spaces, balconies, verandas: wherever your imagination takes you, our timber frame designers can come with you on that journey. We have a range of styles, techniques and materials to help you achieve what you want and make your design expressive of you.

The design process starts with you - with your tastes and aspirations. We encourage you to think carefully about the look, feel and aesthetic of the building you are ultimately trying to achieve. This process is crucial to being able to give a clear brief and ensure you get the impact you want.

Scale and proportion

The oak frame creates a skeleton for the building which can allow you to take away the walls and build ambitious spaces with wide spans and lofty spaces. Things you can consider for your own oak frame home are:

Open plan: Internal walls of a conventional building are often structural. With an oak frame you can take these internal walls away and make open plan spaces.
Vaulted spaces: oak frame homes use a smaller number of timber roof trusses than conventional homes (which use lots of small pieces of softwood timber are not pretty and just leave a bit of storage space), and we put those trusses on show, allowing us to create vaulted roof spaces, one of the most fundamental characteristics of an oak framed home.
Upside down/reverse level homes: If these vaulted spaces can be within the key living areas of your home it allows you to maximise enjoyment of it (although this is certainly not essential). Building an upside down, or reverse level, home if the topography of the land allows, is a way of achieving this. If you are at the plot finding stage, this might be something that you would want to look for.
Mixing ridge heights: Many of our homes have a mixture of double height spaces, single storey spaces and two storey spaces. This means you can enjoy for example a double-height entranceway or living room, and single-height spaces in other areas such as bedrooms.
Hybrid frames: You do not have to make the whole of your home oak framed – choosing oak for only a partial amount of your build can help you achieve impressive living spaces, whilst helping with the budget.

L-R: Shepherds House - a barn style oak framed new-build home, an open-plan oak framed extension in Guernsey, the open plan vaulted living area at Gitcombe Retreat.

L-R: Reverse-level home built on a sloped site with a vaulted living area, Keepers Cottage with differing ridge heights, The Wheel House- a home built with a hybrid frame - the simple oak frame scissor trusses feature only in the living room, kitchen and master bedroom.

Being able to reduce the amount of structural internal walls and create open spaces with an oak frame does mean you need to consider where the positioning of the posts will go. They will have an impact on the layout of the rooms and should be thought about early on, as well as the ideal spans between these posts. There is strong precedence for the combination of timber sections, trusses, spans and spacings which have formed over the years into common practices – what you might call the rhythm and language of framing.

To help you understand what we mean when we talk about spans, here’s a diagram with some of the terminology of an oak frame:

A diagram showing the cross frame and wall frame elements of a structural oak frame

The trusses in a cross frame allow you to span large distances. We have spanned over 20m with large cross frames. However, for a domestic building the ideal span is around 6-7m.
This is not so much a structural maximum, it just helps to avoid vast timbers, and creates a domestic sized vaulted space, which does not feel too cavernous.
From cross frame to cross frame you then have single timbers which cannot span as far as a truss, so generally the ideal length of a bay is around 3.5 - 4m.

Architectural Styles

We work in a wide range of architectural styles. All of our work is bespoke; we can help you design your frame whatever your ambitions are. These groups of styles cover the most typical homes we see our customers building.

Traditional barn style homes – in the 1980s Carpenter Oak’s founders were restoring barns to be converted into homes – this became increasingly popular, and they realised there was a love for these types of homes. This was the foundation for starting to build new barn-like homes, and they continue to be a popular type of home now.

Farmhouse style homes – many of our homes are in more of a farmhouse style, with the traditional features of domestic buildings such as chimneys and traditionally proportioned casement windows.

Contemporary with modern materials or connections – many of our projects are at the more contemporary end, perhaps including more modern materials such as steel connections and glulam beams.

Contemporary with natural materials – we also build homes which are in a contemporary style, but lean on the use of natural materials, giving a softer interpretation of a modern style.

Traditional barn style homes – L-R: Barn conversion in the Cotswolds, striking trusses in Willowplatt barn conversion, large double-height living space in barn-like Pond House, the barn-inspired exterior of Hookwood House.

Farmhouse style homes – L-R: A pretty new-build home, a classic looking Eco Farmhouse, a Cornish Farmhouse nestled in its countryside setting, an oak framed extension to a farmhouse on Dartmoor.

Contemporary with natural materials – L-R: Renton Hall with a Douglas fir extension, Light and airy oak framed modern extension, Larch clad Taigh Na Coille, Douglas fir framed Lochaber House.

Contemporary with modern materials or connections – L-R: Allies Farm with steel tie connections, Damson Fell extension with steel tie donuts, steel connections on show in the Modern Kitchen Link Extension, a contemporary glulam extension.

How does your plot or setting impact your design requirements?

Your plot or setting will also have some influence on the type of style you may choose. For a very rural plot you may want a classic barn-type or farmhouse style home. You may be influenced by the local vernacular such as slate roofing, stone walls, or black stained cladding. A coastal setting may also be an inspiration for the style of a build, leaning on the American style crisp white airy interiors, or more rustic UK coastal style with vintage décor and natural materials such as reclaimed wood and flagstone floors. If you’re planning on building an oak or Douglas fir extension, you’ll want to consider whether you’d like to build a modern extension which acts as a juxtaposition to the building it’s joining, or something which will blend in with your current home.

Images L-R: An extension with stained black cladding, a new-build home with cladding and brickwork, a coastal home with a white Douglas fir frame.

Images L-R: A rustic riverside boathouse, a modern glulam extension to a listed manor, an oak framed extension which sits carefully alongside its green belt barn.

Details and finishes to your timber frame

The overall design choices you will discuss with your architect will influence the details and finishes you want for your frame.

A more contemporary style may include exposed steel elements such as steel flitch plates, protruding or counter-sunk pignuts, or steel tie-rods. These all allow for a minimalist frame with less timber bracing.

How a structural timber frame is joined is also an element to consider. The majority of our customers will favour the traditional method of pegged mortise and tenon. This is a technique which has been used for hundreds of years and certainly stands the test of time. The visible pegs lock the joint together so they cannot pull apart. It's also possible to have your frame joined with steel, and these can be exposed, or hidden within the frame.

All frames will require some sort of cleaning or finish to them:

Green oak, Douglas fir or larch structural frames:

Finishes: they can be either planed or fine band sawn finished whilst at our workshop.
Cleaning: they will pick up marks throughout the build, such as streak marks from sawmills, water staining from transit, and site dirt. Once your frame is installed and in a wind and watertight shell it will need to be cleaned with oxalic acid or sandblasted to remove these marks.

Engineered and Glulam (glue-laminated) structural frames:

Finishes: glulam timbers usually require a coating to give it some protection during the construction phase. Coatings can add tone and colour, or be opaque to maintain the natural aesthetics of the timber, and can come in a matt of gloss finish. We offer a full range of finishes and treatments tailored to the building’s location, service class and aesthetic requirements.
Cleaning: Glulam frames are kept wrapped during the construction process to protect them from heavy stains, but if some marks are picked up, these can be carefully sanded off.

Steel connections on show in an oak framed extension, a Douglas fir home with steel tie beams, an oak framed home with steel flitch plates and counter-sunk pignuts.

L-R examples of timber finishes: Rough sawn green oak, sandblasted green oak, and spruce glulam.

External oak features and material combinations

There are certain features you can add to your home or extension which will allow you to express some oak on the exterior of your building. Some of these are:

Direct glazing: This involves oak cover boards being applied to the outside following the lines of the oak frame, giving the impression of seeing the oak frame from the outside, whilst the oak frame is in fact kept wrapped up inside the glazing system. Find out more about glazing options here.
Porches: These are a popular addition to a timber framed home and give an instant appeal to the front of a home. They can range in size and be open or enclosed with glazing.
Balconies: A fantastic feature on a home which is also functional – it can add to the enjoyment of your home by creating more useable outdoor areas, as well as looking lovely.
Verandas or pergolas: Great for creating a flow between indoor/outdoor spaces, and they can create shade to help stop overheating where you have large areas of glazing.
Gable trusses: A specialised truss designed to create the triangular end wall, or gable, of a building with a pitched roof. It supports the roof’s overhang, helps direct rain away, provides shade, and gives a clean edge to the roofline.
Brise soleil: Can be a fantastic timber feature to the outside of your project, whilst mitigating overheating in heavily glazed areas, and gives a modern look.

Images L-R: Examples of direct glazing, an oak framed porch, a timber framed balcony.

Images L-R: Examples of a timber framed veranda, a gable truss, a brise soleil.

Finishing your home - pairing with other materials

Some final considerations for style are how you choose to finish your house and the other materials you decide to pair it with externally. Many of the homes and extensions we build frames for will be finished in timber cladding, which is classic, and obviously suits a timber frame well. Some customers combine this with some stonework as well, to give a home a real feeling of having sat in its landscape for a while. Using glass, steel and zinc roofs will give a much more contemporary edge to a build, giving a clean, polished finish. Make sure you research lots of images so you know what aesthetic you are going for when briefing your architect.

Images L-R: Exterior timber cladding with red roof tiles, a large family home with timber cladding and a striking ribbed steel roof, a modern mix of glass, zinc and stone cladding.

Images L-R: A mix of timber cladding and brickwork, glass sections with timber cladding, and black stained cladding with a glass and steel extension.

How we can help you

For almost 40 years we've been working with self-builders and architects to design and build homes, extensions, outbuildings and other buildings in a huge variety of styles. We can help you build your dream with your own bespoke structural timber frame. Please get in touch with us and let's start the conversation.

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